HOUSTON, TX—A bilingual picture book about a Mexican birthday celebration, El cumpleaños de mi hermana Dulce / My Sister Dulce’s Birthday by Erika Said (ISBN 978-1-55885-954-8, hardcover, $18.95), is the winner of the 2022 Salinas de Alba Award for Latino Children’s Literature. Published October 31, 2022, this joyful story depicting two girls’ excitement as they prepare for a birthday party is sure to inspire kids’ plans for their own birthday celebrations. In 2019, according to the Cooperative Children’s Book Center, only 225 of the 4,029 children’s books published were written by Latinos; only 235 were about Latinos. The SALINAS DE ALBA AWARD seeks to stimulate the work begun by Arte Público Press and its imprint, Piñata Books, which is dedicated to the publication of children’s and young adult literature that realistically portrays themes, characters and customs unique to US Hispanic culture. In addition to the publication of the book and …
Enjoy this recap of Arte Público Press’ 40th Anniversary Celebration!
Attendees at the welcome tableAuthor and astronaut, José M. HernándezUH Mariachi PumasDr. Blas Canedo-González and Alejandro Magallón, Houston Grand Opera Solero Flamenco dancersFrom left to right: Jessica Rossman, Dr. Nicolás Kanellos, Rolando Maldonado, MD.Picture book loversAttendees at the wine tableAuthor Erika Said, winner of the Salinas de Alba Award for Latino Children’s LiteratureSambabom dancersFrom left to right: Geraldina Interiano Wise, Dr. Nicolás Kanellos, Nellie González, Mikaela Selley, Miriam Maldonado, Dra. Carolina Villarroel, Marina Tristán, Jesús González, Julia Dávila, Rosanna Moreno, Dr. Lorena Gauthereau Attendees at the receptionFrom left to right: Dr. Suresh Khator, Associate Dean of UH Cullen College of Engineering; Dr. Renu Khator, President of the University of Houston; Dr. Nicolás Kanellos, Director of Arte Público PressAuthor Airy Sindik, winner of the Reyes-Olivas Award for the First Book of Latino Children’s and Young Adult LiteratureCecilia Duarte (singer) and Ana María Otamendi (piano), ROCO40th Anniversary in the News Arte Público …
CELEBRATING 40 YEARS!
HOUSTON, TX—Arte Público Press, the country’s oldest and largest publisher dedicated to amplifying US Hispanic voices, will celebrate its 40th anniversary with a performing-arts showcase Thursday, September 15, 2022, from 6:30-9:30 pm at the University of Houston’s Moores Opera House (3333 Cullen Blvd, Houston, TX 77004). Bringing together outstanding artists from a variety of genres, the event will feature author and former astronaut José M. Hernández as the emcee and highlight the vibrant influence of Latin American and Latino cultures. The University of Houston’s Mariachi Puma will welcome attendees; other performers include the Brazilian dance and drum group, Sambabom; the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, presenting a selection of Latino songs in honor of Arte Público Press; Solero Flamenco; and the Houston Grand Opera, doing its children’s production based on Jorge Argueta’s trilingual picture book, Agua, Agüita / Water, Little Water (Arte Público Press, 2017). In addition, two children’s book awards …
Hispanic Theater Digital Exhibit
HOUSTON, TX–The University of Houston’s US Latino Digital Humanities Center (USLDH) announces the release of the interactive Hispanic Theater Collection curated and created by Dr. Gabriela Baeza Ventura and Dr. Lorena Gauthereau. The digital collection centers the Hispanic community within US theater production (1789-2000) and highlights the role that Hispanic theater (actors, writers, producers, musicians, technicians, artists and many others) played in the creation of cultural and sociopolitical capital. Some of the items feature: Miguel Piñero, Miriam Colón, Susy Astol, Chata Noloesca, Don Lalo (Leonardo García Astol), Carpa Theater, The Puerto Rican Traveling Theater, Teatro Campesino, among many others. This digital exhibit draws from the Nicolás Kanellos Theater Collection at UH’s Special Collections. This valuable digital exhibit is a unique and useful teaching and research tool for educators, students and community members interested in performing arts, visual art, art history and Latina/o culture. UH’s USLDH received funding from the American …
Join Us for Hispanic Heritage Month
SEPTEMBER September 15, 2022 | 6:30 – 9:30 pm Showcase of Latino Performing Arts Moores Opera House/University of Houston (3333 Cullen Blvd, Houston, TX) Celebrate Arte Público Press’ 40th anniversary with food, drink and performances by Mariachi Puma, Sambabom, River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, Solero Flamenco, and Houston Grand Opera. Tickets and more details here. September 15-17, 2022 La Raza Unida Party 50th Anniversary Conference University of Texas San Antonio – Downtown Campus (501 W. Cesar E. Chavez, San Antonio, TX) Arte Público Press founder/director Dr. Nicolás Kanellos speaks about publishing opportunities for Latinos. More details here. September 23, 2022 | 10 am – 4:30 pm Latin American Book Fair Love Park (1501 John F. Kennedy Blvd., Philadelphia, PA) Authors and illustrators share their work, including children’s book author Raquel Ortiz, who will delight audiences with her musical storytelling! More details here. OCTOBER October 1, 2022 | 1 – …
Miriam Damaris Maldonado joins Arte Público Press as Program Manager for El proyecto de la literatura puertorriqueña/The Puerto Rican Literature Project (PLPR)
Miriam Damaris Maldonado joins Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage/Arte Público Press at the University of Houston as Program Manager for “El proyecto de la literatura puertorriqueña/The Puerto Rican Literature Project” (PLPR). Damaris Maldonado brings to the project years of experience as an award-winning poet and community organizer. She is an active promoter of cultural events in Houston and founder/member of the Houston-based Colectivo Colibrí, a feminist community organization. She participates and coordinates literary festivals and performs outreach as a social worker and as a member of the Colectivo de Grupos Puertorriqueños. Damaris Maldonado has a background in Human Behavior, Gender and Diversity and is currently studying Creative Writing at the Universidad de Sagrado Corazón in Puerto Rico. Her recent publication is Enraizada (Valparaíso Ediciones). The Mellon Foundation awarded the University of Houston (UH) a grant to establish PLPR, a free, public-facing open-access digital portal for Puerto Rican literature. PLPR …
National Museum of the American Latino to Feature Documents from University of Houston Program
HOUSTON, TX—The Molina Family Latino Gallery, the first physical presence of the National Museum of the American Latino, will open at the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. on June 18, 2022. Established by Congress in December 2020, the new National Museum of the American Latino will feature documents and artifacts from the University of Houston’s Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage project (Recovery), directed by Dr. Nicolás Kanellos, the Brown Foundation Professor of Hispanic Studies and founder/director of Arte Público Press. Dr. Kanellos was a consultant for the gallery, which will exhibit periodicals, photos, documents and books related to his research on the history of Latino printing presses and newspapers, dating back to the late eighteenth century in areas that became part of the United States. Other items on loan from the Recovery Project include documents from the 1929 founding of the League of United Latin American Citizens …
USLDH lanza conjunto de datos sobre mujeres
HOUSTON, TX- El Centro de Humanidades Digitales Latinas de los Estados Unidos (USLDH, por sus siglas en inglés) de la Universidad de Houston anuncia el lanzamiento de un vasto Conjunto de datos sobre autoras que publicaron en revistas y periódicos latinos de los Estados Unidos. Desde 1996, académicos y estudiantes de posgrado del programa Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage (Programa de recuperación del legado escrito hispano de de los Estados Unidos), también conocido como Recovery, han trabajado en la indizacación de periódicos a nivel de artículo para producir metadatos en inglés y español que faciliten a los investigadores la ardua labor de encontrar estos materiales. El resultado se refleja en varios conjuntos de datos que hablan de la diversidad de la vida cultural, política e intelectual de las comunidades atinas en los Estados Unidos. De las 288 publicaciones periódicas indizadas, este extenso conjunto de datos muestra la actividad de …
USLDH Releases Dataset on Women Writers
HOUSTON, TX–The University of Houston’s US Latino Digital Humanities Center (USLDH) announces the release of a comprehensive dataset on over 900 women authors. This dataset documents articles published by women in Hispanic periodicals. Since 1996 Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage (Recovery) scholars and graduate students have worked on indexing newspapers at an article level to produce metadata in English and Spanish to facilitate discoverability for researchers. The output is reflected in several datasets that speak of the diversity of the cultural, political and intellectual life of the Hispanic/Latina/Latino/Latinx community in the United States. This dataset, created from 288 indexed periodicals, demonstrates the activity of Hispanic women writers, including poetry, short stories, essays, serialized fiction, literary notices, speeches, travel writing, interviews and more. Among the writers included are feminists Clotilde Betances and Hortensia Elizondo, activists like Jovita Idar, anarchists such as Blanca de Moncaleano, and poets such as Elvira Yañez de …
Debut Collection Spotlighting Hispanic and Indigenous Peoples in the Southwest Wins Award
HOUSTON, TX—Oscar Mancinas’s evocative collection, To Live and Die in El Valle, has been awarded the 2021 Southwest Book Award from the Border Regional Library Association. The thirteen thought-provoking stories highlight the struggles of Hispanic and indigenous people in Arizona whose lives are impacted by migration, systemic racism and settler colonialism. The Border Regional Library Association (BRLA) was founded in 1966 to promote library service and librarianship in the El Paso/Las Cruces/Ciudad Juárez metroplex. More than 100 library professionals from Trans-Pecos Texas, Southern New Mexico and Northern Chihuahua are members of the organization. The group created the Southwest Book Award in 1971 to recognize books about the region. Vividly depicting working-class communities, Oscar Mancinas creates characters whose lives are shaped by circumstances beyond their control, including migration and discrimination. His characters frequently struggle with a sense of belonging, and their stories eloquently illuminate Hispanic and indigenous experiences in the Southwest. …
