Calendar

Apr
30
Tue
Lecture: Gregory Boyle @ Washtenaw Community College
Apr 30 @ 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm

Literati is proud to be partnering with Dawn Farm to host Gregory Boyle at the Towsley Auditorium at the Washtenaw Community College.

In this presentation, Gregory Boyle will share how compassion, kindness, and kinship are the tools to fight despair and decrease marginalization. Through his stories and parables, all will be reminded that no life is less valuable than another.

The Rev. Gregory J. Boyle

Gregory Boyle is the founder of Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles, Calif., the largest gang intervention, rehabilitation, and re-entry program in the world.

A Jesuit priest, from 1986 to 1992 Father Boyle served as pastor of Dolores Mission Church, then the poorest Catholic parish in Los Angeles that also had the highest concentration of gang activity in the city.

Father Boyle witnessed the devastating impact of gang violence on his community during the so-called “decade of death” that began in Los Angeles in the late 1980s and peaked at 1,000 gang-related killings in 1992.  In the face of law enforcement tactics and criminal justice policies of suppression and mass incarceration as the means to end gang violence, Father Boyle and parish and community members adopted what was a radical approach at the time: treat gang members as human beings.

In 1988 they started what would eventually become Homeboy Industries, which employs and trains former gang members in a range of social enterprises, as well as provides critical services to thousands of men and women who walk through its doors every year seeking a better life.

Father Boyle is the author of the 2010 New York Times-bestseller Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion.  His 2017 book is the Los Angeles Times-bestseller Barking to the Choir: The Power of Radical Kinship.

He has received the California Peace Prize and been inducted into the California Hall of Fame.  In 2014, the White House named Father Boyle a Champion of Change. He received the University of Notre Dame’s 2017 Laetare Medal, the oldest honor given to American Catholics.

May
7
Tue
Martha Jones: Birthright Citizens: A History of Race and Rights in Antebellum America @ Robertson Auditorium (Ross)
May 7 @ 6:00 pm – 7:30 pm
As former slaves struggled to become citizens, they redefined citizenship for all Americans. With fresh archival sources and an ambitious reframing of constitutional law-making before the Civil War, Jones shows how the Fourteenth Amendment constitutionalized the birthright principle, fulfilling the long-held aspirations of African Americans. Martha S. Jones is the Society of Black Alumni Presidential Professor and Professor of History at The Johns Hopkins University. She is a legal and cultural historian whose work examines how black Americans have shaped the story of American democracy. Professor Jones holds a Ph.D. in history from Columbia University and a J.D. from the CUNY School of Law. Her most recent book, Birthright Citizens: A History of Race and Rights in Antebellum America was published by Cambridge University Press in 2018. Register online.
May
23
Thu
S. Max Edelson: The New Map of Empire: How Britain Imagined America Before Independence @ Robertson Auditorium (Ross)
May 23 @ 6:00 pm – 7:30 pm

A Michigan Map Society Lecture

In the eighteenth century, Britain relied on geographic knowledge to reform its American empire. The schemes of colonial development and control that these maps envisioned, Edelson argues, helped provoke the resistance that led to the American Revolution. Lecture presented in collaboration with the Stephen S. Clark Library. Dr. S. Max Edelson is Professor of History at the University of Virginia. His second book, The New Map of Empire: How Britain Imagined America Before Independence (Harvard University Press, 2017) was a finalist for the George Washington Book Prize and received the John Lyman Book Award for U.S. Maritime History by the North American Society for Oceanic History. Register online.

Jun
4
Tue
Patrick Spero: Frontier Rebels: The Fight for Independence in the American West @ Robertson Auditorium (Ross)
Jun 4 @ 6:00 pm – 7:30 pm

Discover the untold Story of the “Black Boys,” a rebellion on the American frontier in 1765. Drawing on largely forgotten manuscript sources from across North America, Spero reveals an often-overlooked truth: the West played a crucial role in igniting the flame of American independence. Patrick Spero is a scholar of early American history, specializing in the era of the American Revolution. He is the Librarian and Director of the American Philosophical Society Library in Philadelphia. Dr. Spero holds a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania. Register online.

Jun
12
Wed
Poetry and the Written Word: Workshop @ Crazy Wisdom
Jun 12 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm

Crazy Wisdom Poetry Series hosted by Joe Kelty, Ed Morin, and David Jibson • Second and Fourth Wednesdays, 7-9 p.m. in the Crazy Wisdom Tea Room • Second Wednesdays are poetry workshop nights. All writers welcome to share and discuss their own poetry and short fiction. Sign up for new participants begins at 6:45 p.m.

Fourth Wednesdays have a featured reader for 50 minutes and then open mic for an hour. All writers welcome to share. Sign up begins at 6:45 p.m. Free. Contact Ed at 668-7523; eacmorso@sbcglobal.net or cwpoetrycircle.tumblr.com.

 

 

Jun
13
Thu
Barbara Stark-Nemon: A Novel Path to a Second Career @ Towsley Auditorium, Washtenaw Community College
Jun 13 @ 10:00 am – 11:30 am

Barbara Stark-Nemon, author of award-winning novels Even in Darkness and Hard Cider, lives, writes, cycles, swims, does fiber arts, and gardens in Ann Arbor and Northport, Michigan. She has degrees in English literature, art history, and speech-language pathology from the University of Michigan and worked with deaf and language disabled children. Even in Darkness is historical fiction based on a family story in 20th century Germany. Hard Cider is contemporary fiction set in northern Michigan. This day pass is free of charge to all members who paid for either the All Thursday Morning Lecture Series Package or the Distinguished Lecture Series and All Thursday Morning Lecture Series Package. Membership is not required for this day pass. Speaker’s Synopsis: The author will describe the path to her current career as a novelist, from her story-telling grandfather to work as a speech-language therapist and teacher. A love of narrative is the common thread. Fictional elements woven into family stories, personal experiences, research, and travel contributed to the writing of both her novels, and a third novel-in-progress. Stark-Nemon will address the challenges and rewards of embarking on an encore career as a novelist.

Jun
24
Mon
Kim Darst: The Iditarod Sled Dog Race Experience @ AADL Downtown
Jun 24 @ 6:00 pm – 7:30 pm

Kim Darst from Husky Haven Sled Dogs will share her experience competing in the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race in Anchorage, Alaska.  Husky Haven Sled Dogs was established in 1999 with two Samoyeds and a dream to run the Iditarod. In 2009 that dream came true, and they were the first team from New Jersey to qualify, enter, and run the Iditarod Sled Dog Race. Come learn about what it takes to train for the Iditarod, and meet one of Kim’s sled dogs!  Copies of Cotton’s Tale, a children’s book about Kim’s story, will be available for sale.

Jun
27
Thu
Tom Grace: The Thriller Alchemist @ Towsley Auditorium, Washtenaw Community College
Jun 27 @ 10:00 am – 11:30 am

Tom Grace is the internationally bestselling author of the Nolan Kilkenny thrillers “Undeniable”, “The Secret Cardinal”, “Bird of Prey”, “Twisted Web”, “Quantum” and “Spyder Web”; and the stand-alone thriller “The Liberty Intrigue”. His books have been translated into eight languages and sold in over twenty-five countries. Grace was born and raised in Michigan, and graduated twice from the University of Michigan with degrees in architecture. He is a member of the International Thriller Writers and resides in Michigan with his family.

The lights dimmed in the auditorium and the speaker for the OLLI Local Author lecture stood center stage. “Imagine if we were to discover a body among us,” he began, “that of a person who met a most unnatural end. There would be an investigation and we would have ourselves a mystery. But if, with the body, we found clues to a looming tragedy and the clock is ticking—then we have a thriller!”

This is the second in a three-lecture series. The subject is A Celebration of Local Authors. The next lecture will take place July 11, 2019. The title is William W. Cook and His Michigan Law Quadrangle.

Jul
11
Thu
Margaret Leary: William W. Cook and His Michigan Law Quadrangle @ Towsley Auditorium, Washtenaw Community College
Jul 11 @ 10:00 am – 11:30 am

Margaret A. Leary became director of the Law Library in 1984 and retired in 2011. From 1973 to 1981, she served as assistant director and from 1982 to 1984, as associate director. She received a BA from Cornell University, an MA from the University of Minnesota School of Library Science, and a JD from the William Mitchell College of Law. Leary worked to build the comprehensive library collection to support current and future research in law and a wide range of disciplines. She also developed strong services to support faculty research. Her biography of William W. Cook was published by the University of Michigan Press in fall 2011. Giving It All Away: The Story of William W. Cook and His Michigan Law Quad describes Cook’s family background, his education at Michigan, and his great success in New York City, which generated the money he was to give to Michigan Law.

This is the third in a three-lecture series.

Jul
24
Wed
Poetry and the Written Word: Ian Haight @ Crazy Wisdom
Jul 24 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm

Crazy Wisdom Poetry Series hosted by Joe Kelty, Ed Morin, and David Jibson • Second and Fourth Wednesdays, 7-9 p.m. in the Crazy Wisdom Tea Room • Second Wednesdays are poetry workshop nights. All writers welcome to share and discuss their own poetry and short fiction. Sign up for new participants begins at 6:45 p.m.

Fourth Wednesdays have a featured reader for 50 minutes and then open mic for an hour. All writers welcome to share. Sign up begins at 6:45 p.m. Free. Contact Ed at 668-7523; eacmorso@sbcglobal.net or cwpoetrycircle.tumblr.com.

July 24 • Ian Haight is an author, translator, and editor who graduated from U-M’s Residential College, worked with the UN, was a tenured professor at a Korean university, and now resides in Germany. His book, Celadon, won the First Book Prize in Poetry from Unicorn Press. He communicates an international, spiritually-minded aesthetic. Visit ianhaight.com.

 

 

lsa logoum logoU-M Privacy StatementAccessibility at U-M