CSRC Newsletter - March 2007

 

Danny Solórzano, Professor of Education and Associate Director of the CSRC, has won the campus-wide Distinguished Teaching Award. Professor Solórzano is widely regarded in the Department of Education as an exemplary teacher, a tireless mentor, and a source of inspiration. He brings his work on minority education, racial dynamics, access, and persistence directly into the classroom. Committed to student success, he helps all students navigate the university system, with an eye to possible roadblocks. Students consistently attribute his belief in them to their progress.

 

An article that appeared in the fall 2004 issue of Aztlán has won a national award in American history. “The Political-Economy of the Mexican Farm Labor Program, 1942–1964,” by Joon K. Kim, won the 2007 ABC-CLIO America: History and Life Award, which is given biennially to recognize and encourage scholarship that advances new perspectives on accepted interpretations or explores previously unconsidered topics in American history. The award will be presented on March 31, 2007, at the annual meeting of the Organization of American Historians in Minneapolis. The CSRC will receive a certificate for publishing the award-winning essay. Kim is an Associate Professor of Sociology and Ethnic Studies at Colorado State Univerity, Fort Collins.

 

Fernando Torres-Gil, Associate Dean of Academic Affairs, Professor of Social Welfare and Public Policy, and Director of the Center for Policy Research on Aging, has been appointed to the board of the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) Foundation. An expert in the fields of health and long-term care, the politics of aging, social policy, ethnicity, and disability, Torres-Gil has authored more than eighty articles and book chapters and six books, including The New Aging: Politics and Change in America. In addition to his academic experience, he has a significant background in government, having served as the first-ever Assistant Secretary for Aging at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and as the Clinton administration’s chief advocate on aging.

 

The Migration Study Group will present David Hernandez, a CSRC Fellow and Assistant Professor of Chicana/o Studies at UCLA, in “Surrogate Detention: Subcontracting U.S. Detention Practices at Home and Abroad” on Thursday, March 1, 12:00 p.m., in 4355D Public Policy. The CSRC is a co-sponsor of the Migration Study Group at UCLA.

 

The UCLA Art + Activism lecture and event series will present Ricardo Dominguez, Assistant Professor in the Visual Arts Department at UC San Diego, in “Border Disturbance Art in an Electronic Age,” on Wednesday, March 7, 4:00 p.m., in 1250 Broad Art Center. Dominguez is a co-founder of The Electronic Disturbance Theater, a group that creates virtual sit-ins by disrupting access to websites. The software system that enables these online protests was developed in 1998 to demonstrate solidarity with the Zapatista communities in Chiapas, Mexico. Dominguez’s performances have been presented in museums, galleries, theater festivals, hacker meetings, tactical media events, and as direct street actions around the world. Art + Activism is a joint program of the UCLA Art|Science Center and the Art|Global Health Center. The CSRC is a co-sponsor of this free public event. A reception will follow.

 

Gloria Steinem will be the keynote speaker at a program marking the opening of the Lupe Anguiano Archive at the CSRC Library. Henry Cisneros will give the closing remarks. The collection documents activist Lupe Anguiano’s work on behalf of human rights, women’s rights, and the protection of the environment. The program will be Monday, March 12, 7:30–8:30 p.m., in Korn Hall, UCLA Anderson School of Management. A reception will follow. The program is free and open to the public, but please RSVP.

 

The CSRC is a co-sponsor of Aqui No Hay Virgenes, an upcoming art exhibition at the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center. The exhibition will present what curators Jennifer Doyle and Raquel Gutierrez characterize as “atypical images of radical Latinas.” Featured artists are Alice Bag, Nao Bustamante, Diane Gamboa, Alma Lopez, and Shizu Saldamando. The opening reception, free and open to the public, will be Thursday, March 15, 7:00–10:00 p.m., at The Village, 1125 N. McCadden Place. The CSRC Library will be at the event promoting its two new efforts, the Mujeres Initiative and the LGBTIQ Initiative, which are designed to increase archival holdings in each area. For more information, call 323-860-7397 or visit the CSRC website on the event or the LGLC website.

 

“An Evening with Culture Clash: A Readers’ Theater with Chicano Studies Students” is the culminating event for “Social History in Performance Art: Featuring Culture Clash,” David G. García’s Chicano Studies course that explores the work of this trio of actor-playwrights. Students will present monologues that are based on oral histories and were written for the class, and Culture Clash will read excerpts from their plays. A discussion will follow. The event, which is co-sponsored by the CSRC, will take place on Friday, March 23, 6:30–9:30 p.m., in A103B Fowler Museum. Open to the public.

 

“Strange Affinities: The Gender and Sexual Politics of Comparative Racialization,” a symposium co-sponsored by the CSRC, will be held Monday, April 23, 3:00–5:00 p.m., in 314 Royce Hall. Participants will include Grace Kyungwon Hong and Rafael Perez-Torres (UCLA), Roderick Ferguson (University of Minnesota), Ruby Tapia (Ohio State), and Judith Halberstam (USC).

 

The Helen Crail/Lorena Parlee collection offers a large number of videotape masters from the late filmmaker Lorena Parlee’s documentary film Mexico. Also included in the collection is rare historical footage used in the production of Ballad of an Unsung Hero, a documentary on Pedro J. González. Researchers will also find vintage musical recordings, papers, and artifacts that belonged to Ms. Parlee’s original research collection. The CSRC Library is indebted to Lorena Parlee’s mother and father, Mr. and Mrs. Crail, for donating not only this collection but also a TV monitor and a multi-region VHS player to the library. The Helen Crail / Lorena Parlee collection is an invaluable addition to the archive’s Pedro J. González Papers.

 

Now available at the CSRC Library are Under the Shade of a Pecan Tree, by Pilar Castañeda (West Sacramento Press, 2005), a fictional novella set in San Antonio during the Depression, and Provocaciones: Letters from the Prettiest Girl in Arvin, by Rafaela Castro (Chusma House, 2006), which contains stories of growing up in a Mexican familia in California during the 1950s and 1960s.

 

The press is excited to announce that the first book in the A Ver book series, Gronk, will be released in March. This book on the extraordinary artist Gronk launches a new era in the study of Latina/o art. Latina/o artists have received too little recognition, especially given their impact on the arts. The books in the A Ver series, each devoted to an individual artist, are designed to rectify this oversight by providing biographies, analysis, bibliographies, and full-color illustrations of the artist’s works. The series is distributed by the University of Minnesota Press. A DVD on Gronk and his works and two online resources—a teacher’s guide, and an extensive digital archive related to the book—will soon be available through the press. For more information on the book and related resources, visit our website. Gronk and the launch of the A Ver series were featured in an article published in the Los Angeles Times on February 25.

 

The new issue of Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies is rolling off the presses and should be in subscribers’ mailboxes shortly. If you are not a subscriber, you will miss the following wonderful articles: Paul Allatson on the poetry and prose of the late Chicano author Gil Cuadros; Steven S. Volk and Marian E. Schlotterbeck on three cultural responses to the femicide of women in Ciudad Juárez; Susan Rippberger and Kathleen Staudt on public schooling on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border; Robert Chao Romero on Chinese-Mexican intermarriage during the early twentieth century; and Tara J. Yosso and David G. García on a critical race analysis of Culture Clash’s play, Chavez Ravine. The dossier section includes personal essays on the year 1972, and Patssi Valdez is the cover artist. If you would like to subscribe, you can go to our store to buy a current subscription or send your postal address to press@chicano.ucla.edu so that we can send you a subscription package. We are also selling full sets of the journal in hard copy for $100. Just send an email!

 

Many of you have written to us saying how useful you have found a book or resource that we published. If you have the time and the interest, feel free to go to Amazon.com and give a customer review. For instance, although The Chicano Studies Reader is being used in lots of classrooms, and we get lots of positive feedback about it, there isn’t much commentary about the text, either negative or positive, at Amazon.com. We prefer to be talked about!

 

To read all issues of Aztlán, please go to the journal hosting site!
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To subscribe to our journal, email your postal address to us!
Information about all our publications is available at the CSRC Press website.

 

The California Latino Caucus Institute announces that applications are being accepted for the Senator Richard G. Polanco Fellows Program. Designed as a public policy leadership training program, the Polanco Fellows Program is based in Sacramento and associated with California State University, Sacramento (CSUS). The application deadline is Saturday, March 31. Anyone interested in applying for the program can either download a PDF of the application, contact Lisa Baca-Sigala at (323) 660-7234 or (323) 664-7222 (fax), or email a request to bacasigala@earthlink.net.

 

The firm of Litt, Estuar, Harrison & Kitson is pleased to announce the establishment of the Emilia Lechuga-Bass Civil Rights Internship for recent college graduates planning to attend law school with the objective of becoming civil rights or public interest lawyers. Interns will gain practical legal experience by working on public interest and civil rights cases, including a number of class actions. Applications for the internship beginning in July 2007 must be received no later than Sunday, April 1. Contact lmoreno@littlaw.com for more information.

 

The CSRC, the IAC, and the University of California Committee on Latino Research are offering research grants in Chicana/o Studies and Latino Policy Studies. The deadline for UCLA faculty and student proposals is Friday, April 27. Visit the IAC website for details and application forms. Please submit complete proposals to CSRC Assistant Director Carlos Haro.

 

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UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center • 193 Haines Hall • Box 951544 • Los Angeles, CA 90095-1544 Campus Mail Code: 154403 • Tel: (310) 825-2363 • Fax: (310) 206-1784