Center for the literary arts in New York State
NYS Writers Institute Spring 2020 season
35 events in 15 weeks!
"We are proud and excited to announce one of our most diverse, ambitious and dynamic lineups of authors," said Paul Grondahl, director of the New York State Writers Institute at the University at Albany.
These acclaimed writers, filmmakers and newsmakers represent some of the most original, authentic and brilliant voices on the scene today. Our events span a multitude of genres and topics, from social justice to physical and mental health, spirituality and sports, poetry and playwriting, literary fiction and humor. There is something here for everyone."
January
A TRIBUTE TO TONI MORRISON (1931-2019)
"The Pieces I Am" documentary screening and discussion
7 p.m. Friday, January 24
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
We gather to pay tribute to Toni Morrison, giant of American literature, Nobel laureate, University at Albany professor (1984-89), and the subject of the beautiful new documentary "The Pieces I Am." A discussion of Toni Morrison’s life and work featuring members of the University at Albany community will immediately follow the screening of the documentary.
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THE CREATIVE LIFE: A CONVERSATION SERIES AT UALBANY
Jhumpa Lahiri, Pulitzer Prize-winning author
7 p.m. Thursday, January 30
Recital Hall, UAlbany Performing Arts Center
Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
One of the best-loved fiction writers of her generation, renowned for her novels of East Indian American immigrant experience, Jhumpa Lahiri fell completely in love with Italian language and literature beginning in 2012. She now reads exclusively in Italian, and spends half the year in Italy. She describes her current creative practice and teaching as an effort to "transmit this awe" of Italian authors and their work. She recently edited and published The Penguin Book of Italian Short Stories (2019), a landmark collection of short works of fiction— nearly half appearing in English for the first time.
During her visit, Lahiri will share her insights into the benefits of immersion in a foreign language for creativity, for broadening perspectives in an increasingly global culture, and for the appreciation of art and life.
February
A SPECIAL SPRING SERIES: WRITING LIFE AND HEALTH
Sandeep Jauhar, MD, bestselling author
Monday, February 3
Craft Talk — 4:15 p.m.
Multi-Purpose Room, Campus Center West
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Q&A — 7:30 p.m.
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
Dr. Sandeep Jauhar is the author of Heart: A History (2018), the gripping and colorful story of the science of the human heart, and a PBS NewsHour/New York Times Book Club pick. Nature said, "Cardiologist Sandeep Jauhar’s exploration of that marvelous muscle, the heart, meshes cutting-edge science, memoir and history."
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SEXUALITY MONTH KEYNOTE SPEAKER
Ryan Russell, NFL football player and poet
8 p.m. Tuesday, February 4
Campus Center Ballroom
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Ryan Russell is the first openly LGBTQ player in the NFL, and the only male athlete in the four major professional sports leagues to self-identify as LGBTQ. A defensive end, Russell played football for Purdue University, the Dallas Cowboys (2015) and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2016-17). He is currently a free agent, and plays off-season and on the practice squad of the Buffalo Bills. Russell is also a writer and published poet. His first book of poetry, Prison or Passion (2019), captures the struggles of being a young boy without a father, and the strength that comes from building one’s own definition of manhood.
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Wesley Yang, journalist and essayist
Thursday, February 6
Craft Talk — 4:15 p.m.
Standish Room Science Library
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Q&A — 7:30 p.m.
Multi-Purpose Room, Campus Center West
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
National Magazine Award-winning essayist Wesley Yang presents The Souls of Yellow Folk (2018), a powerful collection of essays about the biases faced by Asian Americans, and the peculiar racial anxieties awakened in the larger public by their successes. The title of Yang’s book pays tribute to W. E. B. Du Bois’ 1903 classic, The Souls of Black Folk.
The New York Times Book Review, Washington Post, Spectator and Publishers Weekly all named Yang's collection among the best books of the year. His work has appeared in Best American Essays, Best American Magazine Writing, Best Creative Nonfiction, and Best American Nonrequired Reading.
More information
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7: 30 p.m. February 7
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
(United States, 2018, 98 minutes, color)
Directed by Michael Mayer
This adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s classic play features an all-star cast including Annette Bening, Saoirse Ronan, Elizabeth Moss and many others. Director Michael Mayer, who will appear at the Albany Film Festival on Saturday, March 28, won the 2007 Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical for "Spring Awakening."
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WHAT DOESN'T KILL YOU MAKES YOU BLACKER
Damon Young, journalist and humorist
Thursday, February 13
Q&A — 4:15 p.m.
Multi-Purpose Room, Campus Center West
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Q&A— 7:30 p.m.
Campus Center West Auditorium
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
In Damon Young's new book, What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Blacker (2019), he writes about surviving in a world where "existing while Black is an extreme sport." Entertainment Weekly said Young "has already established himself as one of our most vibrant voices on race. Now comes his first book, a blazing memoir in essays."
A senior editor for The Root, Young is co-founder and editor-in-chief of the online magazine VerySmartBrothas, dubbed "the blackest thing that ever happened to the internet" by the Washington Post. Young is also a columnist for GQ.com, and the author of Your Degrees Won't Keep You Warm at Night: The Very Smart Brothas Guide to Dating, Mating, and Fighting Crime.
More information
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7:30 p.m. Friday, February 14
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
(United States, 1994, 104 minutes, color)
Written and directed by Darnell Martin. Starring Luna Lauren Velez, Jon Seda
The first-ever film from a Hollywood studio to be directed by an African American woman, "I Like It Like That" presents the marital difficulties of a young Puerto Rican couple living in the South Bronx. Darnell Martin, who has worked on major films with Oprah, Beyoncé and Spike Lee, will appear at the Albany Film Festival on Saturday, March 28.
More information
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HOW GOLF EXPLAINS THE PRESIDENCY
Rick Reilly, sportswriter and author
7:30 p.m. Wednesday, February 19
Presentation/Q&A
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
Rick Reilly, one of America’s preeminent sportswriters, is the author of the New York Times bestseller, Commander in Cheat: How Golf Explains Trump (2019). Based on an impressive number of interviews with caddies, partners, opponents, golf pros and employees, Reilly presents a vivid glimpse into the President’s inner life.
Named the NSMA National Sportswriter of the Year a total of eleven times, Reilly is renowned for his commentary at Sports Illustrated (1985-2007), particularly his back page column "The Life of Reilly," and for his eight years at ESPN. He is also the winner of the Damon Runyon Award for Outstanding Contributions to Journalism. USA Today called him, "the closest thing sportswriting ever had to a rock star."
More information
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Mahogany Browne, poet, writer, activist and educator
7:30 p.m. Thursday, February 20
Presentation/Q&A
Huxley Theatre, NYS Museum
222 Madison Avenue
Albany NY 12230
6 p.m. Friday, February 21
Presentation/Q&A
Hudson Area Library
51 N. 5th St., Hudson NY 12534
Mahogany Browne is one of the leading poet-activists of the New York City arts scene. Ploughshares declared that "Browne has become her own revolution"—an artist committed in word and deed to changing the world. Both educator and organizer, she is curator of the Nuyorican Poets Cafe Friday Night Slam, publisher of Penmanship Books, founder of the Women Writers of Color Reading Room, director of Black Lives Matter at Pratt Institute, and artistic director at Urban Word NYC. Her poetry collections include Kissing Caskets (2017) and Redbone (2016), which was nominated for an NAACP Image Award. Her YA and children’s books include Black Girl Magic (2018), Woke Baby (2018), and Woke: A Young Poet's Call to Justice (March 2020).
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Film screening: "Motherless Brooklyn"
7 p.m. Friday, February 21
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
(United States, 2019, 144 minutes, color)
Directed by Ed Norton. Starring Ed Norton, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Bruce Willis
Based on the bestselling novel by Jonathan Lethem, who will appear at the Albany Film Festival on Saturday, March 28, "Motherless Brooklyn" is the tale of a NYC detective (Norton) with Tourette syndrome. Both book and film pay homage to the film noir genre.
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FOR COLORED GIRLS WHO HAVE CONSIDERED POLITICS
Yolanda Caraway and Minyon Moore, political strategists
Thursday, February 27
Craft Talk — 4:15 p.m.
Standish Room, Science Library
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Q&A — 7:30 p.m.
Campus Center Ballroom
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Yolanda Caraway and Minyon Moore, political strategists and organizers, are coauthors with Donna Brazile and Leah Daughtry of the book, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Politics (2018), a group memoir of four women who are among the most influential African Americans in the U.S. political sphere.
"This powerhouse group of black women who have worked hard behind the scenes for decades to make our country better, are inspiring the next generation of leaders. For Colored Girls is the blueprint." ―Sean "Diddy" Combs
Minyon Moore was Assistant to the President and Director of White House Political Affairs during the Clinton Administration, serving as principal political adviser to the President, Vice President, First Lady and senior White House staff. She also worked as senior advisor to Jesse Jackson, Michael Dukakis and Hillary Clinton during their presidential campaigns. A past CEO and COO of the Democratic National Committee, she is currently a principal of the Washington D.C. political consulting firm, The Dewey Square Group.
Yolanda Caraway served as Chief of Staff of the National Rainbow Coalition and Jesse Jackson’s 1988 presidential campaign; Deputy Assistant Political Director for the Mondale/Ferraro 1984 presidental campaign; Director of the DNC's Fairness Commission; and Deputy Chair of the Democratic National Committee. She is currently President and CEO of The Caraway Group, a D.C.-based public relations firm that she founded in 1987.
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CLASSIC FILM SERIES
Film screening: "Do the Right Thing"
7:30 p.m. Friday, February 28
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
(United States, 1989, 120 minutes, color)
Directed by Spike Lee. Starring Spike Lee, Danny Aiello, Rosie Perez.
This landmark American film features dancer and activist Rosie Perez in her first acting role as "Tina," the love interest of "Mookie," played by Spike Lee. Perez will appear at the Albany Film Festival on Saturday, March 28.
March
A SPECIAL SPRING SERIES: WRITING LIFE AND HEALTH
Jennifer Block, health care journalist, in conversation with Elisa Albert
Tuesday, March 3
Craft Talk — 4:15 p.m.
Multi-Purpose Room, Campus Center West UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Q&A — 7:30 p.m.
Huxley Theatre, NYS Museum
222 Madison Avenue
Albany NY 12230
Jennifer Block is the author of an eye-opening investigation into the shortcomings of women’s health care— Everything Below the Waist: Why Health Care Needs a Feminist Revolution (2019), "a must-read for women, especially any woman who might ever need to see a doctor" (Washington Post). She poses the question, "Why is the life expectancy of U.S. women today declining relative to women in other high-income countries?" Block is also the author of Pushed (2007), about the national crisis in maternity care. Her investigative reporting into problems with the contraceptive implant, Essure, helped bring about the product’s discontinuation.
Elisa Albert is the author of After Birth (2015), The Book of Dahlia (2008), How This Night is Different (2006), and the editor of the anthology Freud’s Blind Spot (2010).
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LATINIDADES AT THE WRITERS INSTITUTE:
Lady Pink, graffiti artist, activist, educator, & film screening of "Wild Style"
7 p.m. Friday, March 6
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
Note: Early start time 7 p.m.
Lady Pink, a major figure of New York’s graffiti subculture of the 1970s and ‘80s, is the creator of artwork in the collections of many of the world’s leading museums, including the Whitney, the MET, and the Groninger Museum of Holland. The Ecuador-born artist continues to paint commissioned, custom-made mural work. For decades, she has led mural workshops for teenagers, in order to help them realize their artistic visions and to beautify their neighborhoods. Lady Pink will spend the afternoon with students at Albany High School.
"Wild Style"
(United States, 1983, 82 minutes)
Directed by Charlie Ahearn
Lady Pink stars with 'Lee' George Quinones in this film about urban graffiti culture and guerilla artistry in the 1980s. Widely regarded as the first-ever hip-hop motion picture, the film features rare footage of music icon Grandmaster Flash, as well as The Rock Steady Crew, Cold Crush Brothers and Queen Lisa Lee, among others. The film crew also features legendary movie editor Sam Pollard, who will appear at the Albany Film Festival on Saturday, March 28.
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BURIAN LECTURE SERIES ON LIFE IN THE PERFORMING ARTS
Lisa Kron, Tony Award-winning playwright
7:30 p.m. Monday, March 9
Campus Center West Auditorium
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Lisa Kron, actress and playwright, wrote the lyrics and book for the hit Broadway musical, "Fun Home," winner of the 2015 Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Original Score and Best Book of a Musical.
A story of family and sexual awakening, and the first Broadway musical with a lesbian protagonist,"Fun Home" is a musical adaptation of Alison Bechdel’s bestselling graphic memoir of the same name. Ben Brantley of the New York Times called it, "a beautiful heartbreaker of a musical."
Kron is also a founder of the award-winning theatre company, The Five Lesbian Brothers, renowned for absurdist humor and the puncturing of lesbian stereotypes.
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BELOVED HOST OF NPR’S "WEEKEND EDITION"
Scott Simon, author of Sunnyside Plaza
Tuesday, March 10
Craft talk — 4:15 p.m.
Standish Room, Science Library
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Conversation — 7:30 p.m.
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
Scott Simon, beloved host of NPR’s "Weekend Edition" since it first aired in 1985, and one of the best-known voices on American radio, will present his new middle grade book, Sunnyside Plaza (2020). The book tells the story of a developmentally disabled adult woman who seeks to solve the mystery of a number of suspicious deaths in her group home. Kirkus called it, "A tender insight into being different and wonderful."
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Film screening: "The Irishman"
6:30 p.m. Friday, March 13
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
Note: Early start time 6:30 p.m.
(United States, 2019, 209 minutes, color)
Directed by Martin Scorcese. Starring Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci
A major film event of 2019, this gangster movie about the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa is based on the book I Heard You Paint Houses by homicide investigator and true crime author Charles Brandt, who will appear at the Albany Film Festival on Saturday, March 28.
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"DEAD MAN WALKING" AUTHOR PRESENTS NEW MEMOIR
Sister Helen Prejean, death penalty activist and nun
Monday, March 23
Q&A — 4:15 p.m.
Standish Room, Science Library
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Conversation — 7:30 p.m.
Page Hall
UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
Sister Helen Prejean is a Roman Catholic nun and a preeminent advocate for the abolition of the death penalty. Her bestselling book about ministering to death row inmates, Dead Man Walking (1993), was adapted as a 1995 film starring Susan Sarandon (as Sister Helen) and Sean Penn. A member of the Congregation of St. Joseph based in New Orleans, Prejean has previously served as chairperson of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.
Her new memoir, River of Fire (2019), recounts her spiritual journey from praying for God to solve the world’s problems to engaging full-tilt in working to address societal injustices.
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THE CREATIVE LIFE: A CONVERSATION SERIES AT UALBANY
Jerry Saltz, Pulitzer Prize-winning art critic
Tuesday, March 24
Book signing and reception
6:00 p.m.
University Art Museum
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Conversation with WAMC’s Joe Donahue 7:00 p.m.
Campus Center West Auditorium
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Jerry Saltz is one of the most influential and popular culture writers working today. Since 2006, he has been senior art critic and columnist for New York Magazine. Formerly the senior art critic for The Village Voice, he received the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 2018, and was nominated for that award in both 2001 and 2006. For two seasons, he was a judge on Bravo's "Work of Art: The Next Great Artist."
His new book, How to Be An Artist (2020), is full of practical inspiration for creative people - brimming with dozens of brand new rules, prompts, exercises and tips designed to break through creative blocks, ignite motivation, conquer bad habits and help artists of all kinds to realize their dreams. Comedian and artist Steve Martin says, "Inspiration leaps off the pages from Jerry Saltz’s new book on creativity!"
About the Creative Life series:
Created and produced by the New York State Writers Institute, University Art Museum, and UAlbany Performing Arts Center in collaboration with WAMC Northeast Public Radio, this series features leading figures from a variety of artistic disciplines in conversation with WAMC’s "Roundtable" host Joe Donahue about creative inspiration, craft and career.
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A CELEBRATION OF STORYTELLING ON SCREEN
Saturday, March 28
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
The Albany Film Festival brings filmmakers, authors, film industry professionals and film lovers to the University at Albany campus for a day devoted to an exploration of the intersection of writing and film.
Events begin Friday, March 27, with a dazzling 3D immersive light show displayed on the façade of the three-story Science Library, a first-of-its-kind event in the Capital Region.
Visit www.albanyfilmfestival.org for updates and schedule of events.
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LATINIDADES AT THE WRITERS INSTITUTE:
A DOMINICAN WRESTLES WITH HIS ISLAND’S HISTORY
7:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 31
Main Theatre, UAlbany Performing Arts Center
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
A solo play followed by Q&A with writer/performer Edward Paulino and director Samantha Galarza. Eddie’s Perejil is a gripping solo play written and performed by Edward Paulino about a working-class Dominican-American college student who stumbles upon a document describing a long-forgotten genocide against Haitians by Dominicans known as the 1937 Haitian Massacre, el Corte, and temwayaj kout kouto. This discovery and subsequent self-reflection sets him on an inescapable collision course with his romanticized notion of what it means to be Dominican in the diaspora.
April
THE ADVENTURES OF TEDDY ROOSEVELT
Jerome Charyn, novelist in conversation with Paul Grondahl
7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 2
Conversation/Q&A
Huxley Theatre, NYS Museum,
222 Madison Avenue
Albany NY 12230
Jerome Charyn, a colossus of American letters, is the author of fifty books in the last fifty years, including thirty novels. Michael Chabon calls him "one of the most important writers in American literature." Jonathan Yardley of the Washington Post said, "Give this guy a Pulitzer…. No one deserves it more." Charyn’s recent novels have fictionalized the lives of Emily Dickinson, Abraham Lincoln and Jerzy Kosiński. His new book is The Perilous Adventures of the Cowboy King: A Novel of Teddy Roosevelt and His Times (2019), a rollicking tale of the sickly child, NYC Police Commissioner, environmentalist, Rough Rider and "perfect bull in a china shop" who became our 26th President.
Paul Grondahl, director of the Writers Institute, is the author of I Rose Like a Rocket: The Political Education of Theodore Roosevelt (2004).
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LATINIDADES AT THE WRITERS INSTITUTE: CLASSIC FILM SERIES
Film screening: "Purgatorio: A Journey Into the Heart of the Border"
7:30 p.m. Friday, April 3
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
(Mexico/USA, 2013, 80 minutes, color, in Spanish and English)
Directed by Rodrigo Reyes
This stunning documentary about life and landscape at the US-Mexico border was directed by Rodrigo Reyes, who visited Albany in 2018 with his award-winning feature, "Lupe Under the Sun." Former NYS Writers Institute videographer Hugo Perez co-wrote "Purgatorio."
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7:30 p.m. Monday, April 6
Arena Theatre, UAlbany Performing Arts Center
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Staged reading of the new play "Interstate" with equity actors and UAlbany students, followed by Q&A with playwright Amina Henry and director Sarah Blush. "Interstate" follows the cross-country drive of 40-something flight attendant Red and her two kids, Robin and Manny, who are too old to be taking a vacation with their mother. Ex-boyfriends are visited; Texas gets weird; and the Grand Canyon is reached at last. A funny and irreverent new play, "Interstate" asks what it means to be family, and what it is to be a woman.
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Colson Whitehead, major American novelist
8 p.m. Monday, April 13
Reading and McKinney Writing Contest Awards
CBIS (Biotech) Auditorium, Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies Building,
Rensselaer (RPI)
1623 15th Street
Troy, NY 12180
Colson Whitehead, a leading writer of his generation, received the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award and Carnegie Medal for his #1 New York Times bestseller, The Underground Railroad (2016), an alternative history novel about escaped slaves and slave-catchers set in the pre-Civil War South. Whitehead also serves as New York’s official State Author by proclamation of Governor Cuomo under the auspices of the New York State Writers Institute.
The Nickel Boys (2019) is about young men struggling to survive in a Florida reform school based on the notorious, real-life Dozier School for Boys, where dozens of young inmates died under suspicious circumstances. TIME magazine named The Nickel Boys one of the top ten books of the decade.
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A NEW ERA OF CYBERWAR AND CYBERSECURITY
Andy Greenberg, technology journalist
Tuesday, April 14
Craft Talk — 4:15 p.m.
Standish Room, Science Library
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Q&A — 7:30 p.m.
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
Andy Greenberg is the author of Sandworm: A New Era of Cyberwar and the Hunt for the Kremlin's Most Dangerous Hackers (2019). The Los Angeles Times said, "Sandworm is much more than a true-life techno-thriller. It's a tour through a realm that is both invisible and critical to the daily lives of every person alive in the 21st century."
An award-winning senior writer for Wired magazine, Greenberg covers security, privacy, information freedom, and hacker culture. His previous book, This Machine Kills Secrets (2012), was a New York Times Editor’s Choice.
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WINNER OF THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE
Leymah Gbowee, Liberian peace activist and Nobel laureate
12 noon Wednesday, April 15
Presentation/Conversation
Campus Center Ballroom
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Leymah Gbowee received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011 for her work in leading a women’s peace movement that brought an end to the Second Liberian Civil War in 2003. Gbowee shared the prize with fellow Liberian Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Yemen-native Tawakkol Karman. Gbowee and Sirleaf became the second and third African women to win the prize. Gbowee is the founder and president of Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa, which provides educational and leadership opportunities to girls, women and youth in West Africa. She is also the author of Mighty Be Our Powers: How Sisterhood, Prayer and Sex Changed a Nation at War (2011).
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CELEBRATING THE AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT (ADA)
Nadina LaSpina, disability rights activist and author
Friday, April 17
Disability Resource Center Awards/Celebration/Reception — 3 p.m.
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Conversation — 7:30 p.m.
Huxley Theatre, NYS Museum
222 Madison Avenue
Albany NY 12230
An event to celebrate the academic and leadership achievements of students with disabilities and recognition of faculty and staff who create an accessible living and learning environment.
Nadina LaSpina is a prominent activist in the disability rights movement who has been arrested countless times for civil disobedience. This past July, she served as the Grand Marshal of the 5th Annual Disability Pride Parade in New York City.
A fiery orator, she was also a featured speaker at the 2018 Women’s March in NYC. She is the author of the new memoir, Such a Pretty Girl (2019). The book spans her remarkable life from her early years with polio, and her experience as an object of well-meaning pity in her native Sicily; to her adolescence in America, spent almost entirely in hospitals, where she is tortured in the quest for a cure; to her subsequent rebellion, activism, and growing ability to claim and enjoy her own beauty.
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LATINIDADES AT THE WRITERS INSTITUTE:
BRIDGING IMMIGRANT AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE
Valeria Luiselli, novelist and essayist
Wednesday, April 22
Craft Talk – 4:15 p.m.
Standish Room, Science Library
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Earth Day reception - 6 pm
Capital District Latinos
Fellowship Hall
160 Central Avenue
Albany NY 12206
Presentation – 7:30 p.m.
Capital District Latinos
Fellowship Hall
160 Central Avenue
Albany NY 12206
Valeria Luiselli, winner of a 2019 MacArthur "Genius" Award, is a bestselling New York-based Mexican author who writes fiction and nonfiction to voice her outrage about issues regarding 21st century migration in the United States.
She received the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for her bestselling 2015 novel, The Story of My Teeth, and the National Book Critics Circle Award for her 2017 nonfiction book, Tell Me How It Ends: An Essay in 40 Questions, about her work with migrant children from Central America. Her new novel is Lost Children Archive (2019), about one family’s road trip from New York to Arizona—into the heart of the immigration crisis. It was named a best book of 2019 by the New York Times, TIME, NPR, and O, The Oprah Magazine, it was also long-listed for the Booker Prize.
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A SPECIAL SPRING SERIES: WRITING LIFE AND HEALTH
Dr. B. Janet Hibbs, psychologist, family therapist and author
Thursday, April 23
Q&A — 4:15 p.m.
Multi-Purpose Room, Campus Center West
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Presentation/Q&A— 7:30 p.m.
Campus Center West Auditorium
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
B. Janet Hibbs, a leading expert in adolescent mental health, is coauthor with Anthony Rostain, MD, of The Stressed Years of Their Lives: Helping Your Kid Survive and Thrive During Their College Years (2019) — a book that received wide attention in national media. Amid high rates of anxiety and depression among students on college campuses, The Stressed Years of Their Lives reaffirms the vital importance of families in keeping kids healthy, and building social and emotional readiness for school.
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LATINIDADES AT THE WRITERS INSTITUTE:
Zine Festival, Promoting Justice and Hope through Creative Writing
1 p.m. Friday, April 24
Capital District Latinos
160 Central Ave, Albany
Zines, short for magazines or fanzines, are self-made and published creative writing pieces that explore a topic of interest. They are created with any available materials from collage, digital photography, hand-written writing, cartoons, pasted images, and digital designs. The Zine Fair hosted by Capital District Latinos will feature zines by more than 100 students from UAlbany, the College of Saint Rose, Emma Willard School, Averill Park and Castle Island Montessori. Come experience how students, from elementary school to college, examine important issues of racial justice, culture, identity, language, gender and more. You can even begin to create your own zine!
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7:30 p.m. Friday, April 24
Page Hall, UAlbany Downtown Campus
135 Western Avenue
Albany NY 12203
(United States, 1933, 76 minutes, b/w)
Directed by Alfred E. Green. Starring Barbara Stanwyck, George Brent.
A classic of pre-Code Hollywood, "Baby Face" tells the story of a young woman who uses sexual charm for personal and social advancement. This screening will feature "objectionable" footage removed in 1933 by the New York State Censorship Board in its mission to protect public morality.
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A SPECIAL SPRING SERIES: WRITING LIFE AND HEALTH
Louise Aronson, MD, bestselling author on aging
Wednesday, April 29
Presentation/Q&A— 10 a.m.
Carondelet Hospitality Center,
385 Watervliet Shaker Road
Latham NY 12110
[Registration required]
Presentation/Conversation — 4:15 p.m.
Multi-Purpose Room, Campus Center West
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Louise Aronson is author of the New York Times bestseller, Elderhood: Redefining Aging, Transforming Medicine, Reimagining Life (2019). The reviewer for Nature called it, "Exquisitely written… a new paradigm: a re-balancing act in which technology has a role but the focus returns to care…. One can only hope its practices are adopted swiftly." Aronson is Professor of Medicine at UC San Francisco, where she directs UCSF Health Humanities and Social Advocacy Initiative.
May
BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND
7:30 p.m. Saturday, May 2
Main Theatre, Performing Arts Center
UAlbany Uptown Campus
1400 Washington Avenue
Albany NY 12222
Advance tickets: $15 general public • $10 students, seniors & UAlbany faculty/staff.
Day of show tickets: $20 general public • $15 students, seniors & UAlbany faculty/staff.
For more information, contact the PAC Box Office: (518) 442-3997.
Selected Shorts, Public Radio International's wildly popular series and podcast comes to town offering a unique evening of literature in performance. It's story time…for adults. Spellbinding short stories by established and emerging writers take on new life when they are performed by stars of stage, screen and television.