Letras Latinas, the literary initiative at the Institute for Latino Studies (ILS), is pleased to be presenting three events in March for both the campus and South Bend communities—partnering with the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art on March 18; the St. Joe County Public Library on March 25; and the Department of Film, Television and Theatre on March 26, respectively.
Kicking off this trio of programs is the second installment of “Poets & Art: Ekphrasis at the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art.” The Museum is teaming up with the ILS to welcome award-winning, California-based poet Adela Najarro, who is giving a talk and performing her art-inspired poems on March 18. In addition to also teaching a community workshop later in the week, Najarro will be a guest in “Central American Narratives in the United States,” a course where Notre Dame students have been reading and discussing, Variations in Blue, her latest book. The class is taught by ILS post-doctoral fellow, Maryam Parhizkar, who will be introducing Najarro at the public event.
“This semester, I’m teaching a seminar in which students engage creative expression from the region’s many diasporas, revealing the complexity of Central American life in the United States. Najarro’s poems offer us one stunning lens for anchoring what it means for a Nicaraguan poet to turn towards her homeland while making sense of her own place and experiences within the U.S. landscape. What a gift for our community to engage with Najarro’s poems not only on the page, but by convening her voice in the flesh," said Parhizkar.
On March 19, the “Poets & Art” initiative will also welcome Notre Dame alum and former Poet Laureate of Mississippi, Beth Ann Fennelly, who will join Najarro as a Poet-in-Residence at the Raclin Murphy Museum that day, as well.
“The plan all along was to also host, when feasible, writers who are guests of other Notre Dame units—in this case the Creative Writing Program. Our aim is to have writers spend time in the galleries in order to produce new art-inspired work. The ultimate goal is a co-edited volume of these commissioned pieces alongside reproductions of the art that inspired them,” said Francisco Aragón, Letras Latinas director, poet, and Latino Studies Professor of the Practice. “In late April, for example, the Irish poet Padraig Ó Tuama, who is giving the keynote at ‘The Art of Encounter’ symposium at the Museum, has agreed to spend time with the permanent collection to compose something for our ekphrastic initiative,” Aragón added.
The following week, Letras Latinas will host fiction writer Ruben Reyes, Jr. for the second installment of the Letras Latinas Community Reading Series, held each spring at the main branch of the St. Joe County Public Library. The series responds to the University’s Strategic Framework, which calls for more meaningful engagement with the city of South Bend. Reyes, Jr. will read from his work and sit for a conversation with graduate student Paulina Hernández-Trejo, who will introduce him on March 25. Earlier in the week, she will conduct a more extensive interview with Reyes, Jr. as part of the Letras Latinas Oral History Project, which currently archives eighty interviews going back to 2005.
“As an English Ph.D. student from the El Paso-Juárez Borderlands researching U.S. Latinx Literature and its relationships to borders, (im)migration, and the meaning of home—I am honored to be in conversation with Ruben Reyes Jr. about his most recent work Archive of Unknown Universes and his short story collection, There Is a Rio Grande in Heaven. We live in an age where borders, both fictional and material, continue to affect the fabric of our collective realities. Through artistic works like Reyes’s, we witness how literature is an effective technology that dissects our constructions of borders and the interlinked histories of our continent,” said Hernández-Trejo.
Reyes, Jr.’s collection of stories and his debut novel form part of the curriculum in, “On the Move: Migration in American Literature,” a seminar taught this term by Associate Professor of English, Francisco Robles. The Salvadoran American writer will visit the class to dialogue with Robles’ students.
Letras Latinas is also joining forces with the Department of Film, Television and Theatre (FTT) to co-present its third March event, welcoming Notre Dame alum and playwright Dolores Díaz and theatre director Gabrielle Randle-Bent from the University of Chicago, for a staged reading of, George Washington’s Mexican Birthday. Set in Laredo, Texas, Diaz’ play will be performed in DPAC’s Regis Philbin Studio Theatre on Thursday, March 26. One of the plays co-producers is Anne Garcia Romero who, in addition to being the author of several plays, is an FTT Professor. Both Diaz and Randle-Bent will visit, “Playwriting” and “Adaptation,” taught by Garcia Romero, as well as, “Acting and Directing New Work for the Stage, taught by Sarah Gitenstein, an FTT Assistant Professor and co-producer of the performance. The cast and production team include students Ryan Madrid, Eny Ramirez, Jenisse Jarquin, Diego Ramos, and Annika Fernandez, Notre Dame alum Timothy Merkle, and local professional actor Jared Fernley. Inviting Díaz was the brainchild of Karen Richman, Director of Undergraduate Studies at the ILS, and Latino Studies Professor of the Practice.
“The idea of inviting Notre Dame alum Dolores Díaz emerged in July, 2024. I had taken the students in my Latino Studies internship course to see Timeline Theatre Company-Chicago’s production of Black Sunday, Díaz’ acclaimed depression-era play that addressed the intersecting ecological and social calamities of the dustbowl and the deportation of many people, including U.S. citizens, to Mexico. The students and I were fortunate to share a dinner with the playwright and take part in a free-flowing conversation about experiences of being a student at Notre Dame, career discernment and the playwriting process. I thought then that a visit by Dolores to present a staged reading of one of her works and to interact with students would be an unforgettably inspired experience for all. I am so excited and grateful to Letras Latinas and Anne Garcia Romero to see the idea coming to fruition,” said Richman who, like Garcia Romero and Francisco Robles, is a member of the Letras Latinas Faculty Advisory Circle.
For full details about each event, please visit: