UPCOMING BLFC Meetings:
May 8, 2024
May’s theme of Borderlands Environment focuses on BCA member and author Renata Golden, with her new book out this March: Mountain Time: A Field Guide to Astonishment. Her essays explore the Chiricahua Mountains just north of the Mexico border. As usual, we'll send out supplemental materials and a flyer in 1-2 weeks.
Renata's essays have been published by River Teeth, Creative Nonfiction Magazine, True Stories, About Place Journal, Terrain.org, and Border Crossing, and others. Her essays also grace an anthology to celebrate the centennial of the Gila Wilderness. She is a writer, editor, and naturalist, with an MFA in creative writing from the University of Houston. Renata has called the Chiricahua Mountains home and now lives in the shadow of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in New Mexico.
“Mountain Time: A Field Guide to Astonishment, though marketed as a ‘field guide,’ subverts the field guide model. … Rather than tell you what to do, it asks you to think: about history, people, and the natural world—and humankind’s collisions among them all. … The primary tension in Golden’s essays often centers on a question of agency: to act or not to act? Do we carry the weight of our history? … Feed the hungry migrant? Save a bluebird at the expense of a snake? … How long must we survive in a place before we can say we belong there? How much time passes after we leave a land before it forgets us? … Such a humble approach to being human is sure to astonish us all.” (review by B.J. Hollars)
Buy: https://ugapress.org/book/9798988732129/mountain-time/
Loan: WorldCat Libraries: https://search.worldcat.org/title/1417063168
Check your local bookseller!!
PAST BLFC Meetings:
April 10, 2024
Our author for the topic of culture in April’s BLFC meeting is Héctor Tobar, whose most recent book is: “Our Migrant Souls: A Meditation on Race and the Meanings and Myths of ‘Latino’.” He was a featured author last week at the Tucson Festival of Books.
A new book by the Pulitzer Prize–winning writer about the twenty-first-century Latino experience and identity.
In Our Migrant Souls, Pulitzer Prize–winning writer Héctor Tobar delivers a definitive and personal exploration of what it means to be Latino in the United States right now. “Latino” is the most open-ended and loosely defined of the major race categories in the United States, and also one of the most rapidly growing. Composed as a direct address to the young people who identify or have been classified as “Latino,” Our Migrant Souls is the first account of the historical and social forces that define Latino identity.
Taking on the impacts of colonialism, public policy, immigration, media, and pop culture, Our Migrant Souls decodes the meaning of “Latino” as a racial and ethnic identity in the modern United States, and gives voice to the anger and the hopes of young Latino people who have seen Latinidad transformed into hateful tropes and who have faced insult and division—a story as old as this country itself.
"Tobar’s book should be read in the context of other works that, for more than a century, have tried to elucidate the meaning of latinidad. . . Our Migrant Souls is, therefore, only the latest attempt to pin down an inherently slippery concept. More than these other works, though, it engages in contemporary debates and issues, such as how Latinos have related to Blackness and indigeneity, the question of why some Latinos choose to identify as white, and the political conservatism of certain Latino communities. It is also the most lyrical and literary of the genre, harnessing Tobar’s deep talents as a writer and his fluency in pop culture, and offers a more intimate look into the barrios, homes, and minds of people who, he argues, have been badly, and sometimes willfully, misunderstood."
—Geraldo L. Cadava, The Atlantic
Héctor Tobar is the author of six books published in fifteen languages. Bookpage calls Our Migrant Souls "one of the most important pieces of Latino nonfiction in several decades." The New York Times calls Our Migrant Souls, "a resonant and deeply affecting book," and Publisher's Weekly calls it "lyrical and uncompromising." Héctor is a Professor of English and Chicano/Latino Studies at the University of California, Irvine. He's written for The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Harpers, National Geographic, and was a contributing writer for the New York Times opinion pages. Héctor has also been also a columnist for the Los Angeles Times and its bureau chief in Buenos Aires and Mexico City.
Tobar’s website: https://www.hectortobar.com/home
World Catalogue: https://search.worldcat.org/title/1345216861
Publisher Source: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374609917/ourmigrantsouls
As usual, in a week or so we'll be sending out additional supportive materials, interviews, podcasts, articles etc. as well as a flyer for you to share on social networks. This is a fabulous book and an inspiring, captivating author! Please join us.
February 14, 2024
John B Washington, Tucson resident, is an award-winning journalist and translator and has written two books and innumerable articles on immigration and border politics. We’ll be focusing on his newest from Haymarket Books: “The Case for Open Borders. “
Register free here for this meeting and you’ll also receive a flyer and many additional supporting materials:
We’ll call for questions to John for use in the first half of our interview, followed by an open Q&A.
Brilliant and provocative, The Case for Open Borders deflates the mythology of national security through border lockdowns by revisiting their historical origins; it counters the conspiracies of immigration’s economic consequences; it urgently considers the challenges of climate change beyond the boundaries of narrow national identities. Grounding its argument in the experiences and thinking of those on the frontlines of the crisis, each chapter profiles a character impacted by borders spanning the globe. Those portraits include provocative analyses of the economics and ethics of bordering, concluding that if we are to seek justice or sustainability we must fight for open borders.
"John Washington’s The Case for Open Borders is a compelling, empathetic argument, a far-reaching look into the origins of borders. Washington is one of our most thoughtful, creative, and humane journalists, and this new work will make people think differently about what they think they already know, about what divides and unites the world in new, surprising ways. Highly recommended." — Greg Grandin
Book:
Purchase: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/2199-the-case-for-open-borders; Amazon: https://a.co/d/3UGStOu
Loan: https://search.worldcat.org/title/1412643408
January 10, 2024
January’s BLFC book selection is “Continental DIVIDE: Wildlife, People, and the Border Wall” (2012). Krista Schlyer has graciously agreed to join us for our 10 a.m. MST meeting on January 10th.
Schlyer is a well-known photographer and writer, a Senior Fellow in the International League of Conservation Photographer and winner of the Ansel Adams Award for Conservation Photography, among many other distinctions. Her book, “Continental Divide,” has won Southwest Book of the Year Award, “Best of the Best” by the American Library Association, and other awards.
“Krista Schlyer’s deeply informative and visually head-turning ode to the rich borderland ecosystems being undone in the mad―in every sense of the word―rush to build a wall between one side of a line in the sand and the other, should be required reading for any legislator with a hand in federal immigration policy.” Texas Observer 2013
In documenting the changes to the ecosystems and human communities along the border while the wall was being built, Schlyer realized that the impacts of immigration policy on wildlife, on landowners, and on border towns were not fully understood by either policy makers or the general public. The wall not only has disrupted the ancestral routes of wildlife; it has also rerouted human traffic through the most pristine and sensitive of wildlands, causing additional destruction, conflict, and death—without solving the original problem.
Book: “Continental DIVIDE: Wildlife, People, and the Border Wall”
Krista Schlyer Website: https://kristaschlyer.squarespace.com/projects/borderlands-h346n-k8ngj
WorldCat Libraries: https://search.worldcat.org/title/821725691
Check with your local independent book seller.
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Continental-Divide-Wildlife-People-Border/dp/1603447431
December 13, 2023
In December we’re branching into a less familiar book format to familiarize participants with its increasingly popular use, including in border crossing publications due to its readabilty: the Graphic Novel.
Our selection is a graphic memoir by Henry Barajas, a Tucson native of Yaqui/Mexican descent, entitled: La Voz De M.A.Y.O.: Tata Rambo. It is based on the oral history of his great grandfather, a WW II veteran who founded the Mexican, American, Yaqui, and Others (M.A.Y.O.) organization, which in the early 1970’s successfully lobbied the Tucson City Council to improve living and working conditions for members of the Pascua Yaqui tribe. This action led to the Yaqui/Yoeme gaining federal recognition and their “barrio” homelands escaping city plans for acquisition.
"A resonant, neglected slice of American history is told for the first time with art by J. GONZO, letter art by BERNARDO BRICE, edited by CLAIRE NAPIER,and LA VOZ DE M.A.Y.O boasts a script by HENRY BARAJAS the great-grandson of Ramon Jaurigue, a.k.a. Tata Rambo."
Henry, now living in Hollywood, has agreed to meet with us and discuss our double focus: the role of graphic novels in literature, and the importance of the developments he describes in his own family history and in preserving aspects of Yoeme life and of Tucson's and the Southwest's cultural diversity. Henry Barajas is best known for this graphic memoir and has contributed to anthologies that benefit mass shooting Route 91 victims and The Southern Poverty Law Center, such as Where We Live and The Good Fight. Barajas is the new author of the longtime comic strip series: Gil Thorp. He was deejay for KXCI, the online editor of the Tucson Weekly, former Arizona Daily Star writer/news assistant and was nominated for the Shel Dorf Blogger of the Year award for his work at The Beat.
We will also include other reading and viewing materials to give deeper insight into the Yaqui/Yoeme culture and history in the Southwest and in Mexico.
Readers can buy the book directly from Henry Barrajas and get a personalized copy here: here> https://latinxpress.square.site/.
Henry has also given me a link for the electronic version for anyone who is being thrifty and may not be able to afford the monthly book acquisitions: let me know and I"ll share it with you for your own digitized version.
You can also get it on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Voz-M-Y-Rambo/dp/153431363X
World Cat: https://www.worldcat.org/title/1120192592
November 8, 2023
Our November book selection is “Rivermouth: A Chronicle of Language, Faith, and Migration” (June 2023) by Alejandra Oliva. Ms Oliva has kindly agreed to meet with us on November 8th, and we’re excited to have this remarkable emerging author whose essays, poems and border writings have been nominated for a Pushcart Price and received a Whiting Nonfiction grant. Her essays have appeared in New York Times, The Nation, Time, Patagonia and Catapult.
“Oliva’s excellent debut recounts her experiences volunteering as a Spanish-English translator in an immigration detention center at the U.S.-Mexico border beginning in 2016….With uncut rage and breathtaking prose, Oliva edifies, infuriates, and moves readers all at once. This is required reading. “
—Publisher’s Weekly (starred review)
“Alejandra Oliva is a brilliant new voice of her generation, a writer of resistance with echoes of Simone Weil; her attention to immigration justice reaches us as a prayer. Translation in her hands becomes a deeper type of storytelling where bearing witness to injustices of immigration becomes not only a path of political reform but spiritual transformation. Rivermouth is a rich delta of braided essays where we are invited into spaces that break our hearts and carry us to a place of healing grace.”
—Terry Tempest Williams, author of Erosion: Essays of Undoing
In this powerful and deeply felt memoir of translation, storytelling, and borders, Alejandra Oliva, a Mexican-American translator and immigrant justice activist, offers a powerful chronical of her experience interpreting at the US-Mexico border. Having worked with asylum seekers since 2016, she knows all too well the gravity of taking someone’s trauma and delivering it to the warped demands of the U.S. immigration system. As Oliva’s stunning prose recounts the stories of the people she’s met through her work, she also traces her family’s long and fluid relationship to the border—each generation born on opposite sides of the Rio Grande.
In Rivermouth, Oliva focuses on the physical spaces that make up different phases of immigration, looking at how language and opportunity move through each of them: from the river as the waterway that separates the U.S. and Mexico, to the table as the place over which Oliva prepares asylum seekers for their Credible Fear Interviews, and finally, to the wall as the behemoth imposition that runs along America’s southernmost border.
As investigative and analytical as she is meditative and introspective, sharp as she is lyrical, and incisive as she is compassionate, seasoned interpreter Alejandra Oliva argues for a better world while guiding us through the suffering that makes the fight necessary and the joy that makes it worth fighting for.
Alejandra Oliva website: https://www.olivalejandra.com/ (see “Books” tab for 20% off Bookshop affiliate link)
BOOK: Rivermouth: A Chronicle of Language, Faith, and Migration,
WorldCat Libraries: https://www.worldcat.org/title/1346215513
Buy:
· Indie bookstores
· Penguin Random House https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/720261/rivermouth-by-alejandra-oliva/
October 11, 2023
October’s program features the Pilgrimage to Magdalena film produced by BCA, with the link provided to those who register for this free discussion. You’ll need to view the film on your own before the call.
Our three speakers offer rich perspectives on this tradition as well as other cultural insights into the Tohono O’odham ways of life, and all have participated in the centuries-old pilgrimage to Magdalena.
Dr. Seth Schermerhorn has authored several articles used for this program, focusing on traditions around “Walking to Magdalena.” Bernard Siquieros helped found and was curator of education for the Himdag Ki Tohono O’odham Nation Cultural Center and Museum. Regina Siquieros, an educator and also a member of the Nation, will share traditional songs and stories of the Tohono O’odham people.
Following are materials sent out to the BLFC, and the video link will be sent to you in once you register here: https://bca.app.neoncrm.com/np/clients/bca/event.jsp?event=2853.
Two papers discussing Tohono O’odham customs around the Pilgrimage to Magdalena:
Additional Links:
· The website of the Kino Historical Society has a great selection of articles and videos about this rich tradition. http://padrekino.com/kino-s-legacy/kino-pilgrimage/. Explore the many resources here.
· The second is an excellent video: “Journey for Cultural Preservation: A Tohono O’odham Story.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INg6yCGZKYg Don’t miss this one; it will help create a broader understanding of the O’odham culture and traditions, and Bernard Siqueiros is one of those interviewed.
· The third is a lovely video in Spanish, “La Fiesta de San Francisco Javier Magdalena de Kino” by Sergio Gabriel Raczko (2013): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsSr2ilxPeY.
Lastly, here are two articles on the pilgrimage:
· https://borderzine.com/2010/04/mandas-a-magdalena/ George Thomson of Nogales, AZ (teacher at Nogales HS and writer for Borderzine)
· https://www.nogalesinternational.com/news/pilgrims-have-many-motives-to-trek-to-magdalena/article_855fea0c-e6c0-11e9-8ace-9fda04bc9820.html links you to a Nogales International article from 2019
August 9, 2023
An interview and discussion with Tom Zoellner, author of Rim to River: Looking Into the Heart of Arizona, which takes us on an insightful trek through Arizona’s heartland, both geographically and personally. Tom Zoellner is a former staff writer for The Arizona Republic and the San Francisco Chronicle, and the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Lannan Foundation.
“In Rim to River, Zoellner interweaves his hike along the Arizona Trail from Utah to Sonora with stories about the history and culture of the state. It is a journey well worth taking with him, a travelogue about an ancient and unforgiving land where humans have desecrated its beauty and sucked Pleistocene aquifers lower and lower through a series of boom-and-bust economies that never seem to last and never seem to end. A place where the contrast between the stark grandeur of the landscape and the tawdry creations of our contemporary society bounces back and forth with an energy that often seems obscene until you realize how transient those creations are.”—Thomas E. Sheridan, author of Arizona: A History, Revised
Book: Rim to River: Looking Into the Heart of Arizona by Tom Zoellner
VIDEOS:
An interview with Tom Zoellner about this book: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2ZWYQUuzz8
A very interesting interview Tom Zoellner conducted with David Yetman can be found here: https://www.crowdcast.io/e/pv16cjpx.
July 12, 2023
Our July reading was: “Landscapes of Fraud: Mission Tumacacori, the Baca Float, and the Betrayal of the O’Odham.” (2016) The author is Thomas E Sheridan, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Arizona, and Research Anthropologist at the Southwest Center. He has been involved in land-use politics in Arizona and the Southwest for close to twenty years. Author of many books on the topic of the West, Sheridan is also a major contributor to Pima County’s visionary Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan.
“Landscapes of Fraud” unearths speculative real estate failures from the 1700’s to modern days that have dispossessed the people living on the land of southern Arizona in a wide-reaching pattern, exposing the spaces these capitalist developers attempted to create and the existing social spaces that were destroyed as a result.
In particular, Sheridan examines the O’Odham culture, its fragmentation by the Spanish, and the dissolution of native autonomous communities accustomed to seasonal movements across their landscapes. Of particular focus are the Tumacácori and nearby land grants. The story unearths the recurring destructive pattern of transforming the concept of land from a communal resource into a commodity with value ascribed by its being bought and sold.
“Rich history of the interaction between people, land, and capitalism.”—SMRC Revista
BOOK: “Landscapes of Fraud: Mission Tumacacori, the Baca Float, and the Betrayal of the O’Odham.” (2016) by Thomas E Sheridan.
WorldCat Libraries: : https://www.worldcat.org/title/232330091
Buy: Indie bookstores, Amazon, & University of Arizona Press: https://cdcshoppingcart.uchicago.edu/Cart2/ChicagoBook?ISBN=9780816534418&PRESS=arizona
June 14, 2023
Our book and author interview for June: “Vanishing Frontiers” The Forces Driving Mexico and the United States Together,” by Andrew Selee. (2018).
Dr. Selee’s compelling data and a collection of voices from Mexico bring to life the countless connections we share across our southern border. Most illustrative of all the states, Arizona depends on Mexico for its economic well-being and has been more innovative than any other state in embracing and harnessing the opportunities that come with cross-border collaboration.
With painstaking research and intriguing voices of business leaders, migrants, chefs, media and sports figures, Dr. Selee compellingly brings the facts home: We need each other. Andrew Selee looks at the Mexico that we in BCA recognize well, showing how it increasingly influences our daily lives in the United States in surprising ways -- the jobs we do, the goods we consume, and even the new technology and entertainment we enjoy.
Andrew Selee is President of the Migration Policy Institute which provides research, analysis and new ideas for immigration and integration policy in the United States, Europe, and around the world. (https://www.migrationpolicy.org/about/staff/andrew-selee. He was the founding Director of the Center's Mexico Institute and is an adjunct Professor at Georgetown University. Selee writes frequently in the national press and has a regular column in Mexico’s El Universal newspaper.
BOOK: “Vanishing Frontiers” The Forces Driving Mexico and the United States Together”
Worldcat Libraries: https://www.worldcat.org/title/1038312022
Buy: Indie bookstores and https://www.amazon.com/Vanishing-Frontiers-Forces-Driving-Together/dp/1610398599
VIDEOS:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYuCzaOZC6g “Compromise on the U.S.-Mexico Border: A Discussion with Andrew Selee” (2019) (61 minutes)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pM2YXbRbweU The Mexico-China Economic Relationship: Examining Licit and Illicit Trade Practices. Woodrow Wilson Center (3 minutes)
PODCAST: (best short overview) https://www.cfr.org/podcasts/mexico Why It Matters: Mexico (October 14,2021) Perspectives from Council on Foreign Relations on effects of Mexico on daily life in the U.S., covering immigration, trade, culture, security, economics and overall cooperation … the determinant of success. (31 minutes)
May 10, 2023
May’s selection was “In the Shadow of the Freeway: Growing Up Brown and Queer,” by Dr. Lydia Otero, a Latinx historian and author known for their work on marginalized communities in Arizona. This fascinating book combines memoir with family descriptions, local history and archival material, documenting the mid-Late-twentieth century period of freeway construction through Tucson and the destruction of much of the barrio where they grew up, in the process.
Otero founded and directed a public history program at the U of A documenting the experiences and contributions of people of Mexican descent in the borderlands region. They were a tenured professor at the Department of Mexican American Studies for nearly 20 years, until 2020. Otero’s persona is now a writer; their third book is currently in publication. “In the Shadows of the Freeway” was selected in 2021 by the Pima County Library as one of its "Southwest Books of the Year."
BOOK: “In the Shadow of the Freeway: Growing Up Brown and Queer”
Worldcat Libraries: https://www.worldcat.org/title/1130290145
Buy: local indie bookstores and https://www.amazon.com/Shadows-Freeway-Growing-Brown Queer/dp/1734118008
VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yZnTs8849k
The attached link is to Otero’s recent conversation with MACRI, the Mexican American Civil Rights Institute. It provides an intimate and revealing insight into not only Lydia’s experience growing up in a now-destroyed Tucson barrio, but the experiences shared by many in the discrimination and later the cultural appropriation of these areas of Mexican-American history.
AUTHOR WEBSITE: https://www.lydiaotero.com/
April 12, 2023
Our April Zoom meeting was attended by 46 members who delighted in our interview and Q&A with Luis Alberto Urrea and his wife Cindy. Luis is a world-renowned author of over 18 books. Our group has read three of his books in our 3-4 year history: “The Hummingbird’s Daughter,” “Into the Beautiful North,” and “The Devil’s Highway.”
We covered a wide range of topics including the border, Hispanic life, migration history and characters on both sides of the border. Cindy and Luis shared their inspiring collaboration in researching topics and the organization of events around the books. The discussion also covered their perspectives on staying positive in difficult social conditions, the roles of family in life and writing, questions of who has the right to “tell the immigrant story,” and the broad expanse of Luis’ writings beyond being the “literary conscience of the border,” as he has been described.
Listen in to one of our most beloved storytellers and you’ll walk away with a deeper appreciation of many aspects of creativity, centeredness, and optimism in the face of everyday challenges.
VIDEO: This interview of Urrea by Bill Moyers is directly relevant to our discussion, and well worth the time to hear Urrea's perspectives on life and writing and his books, and to see an expert storyteller in action. It was recorded in February, 2023. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcOifzI3kt4
FEBRUARY 8, 2023
Book: “The Nature of Desert Nature,” a compilation of writings by desert authors, compiled and edited by Gary Paul Nabhan.
Nabhan offers his own thoughts and invites friends, colleagues, and advisors from his more than four decades of study of deserts to bring their perspectives. Through scientists, artists, desert contemplatives, poets, and writers, each essay offers renewed vocabulary and thoughtful perceptions. Encompassing history, culture, science, and spirit, “The Nature of Desert Nature” celebrates the bounty and the significance of desert places. Our discussion included fascinating discourse on heirloom grains, migrant farmworkers, tribal issues, as well as the spiritual dimension of the desert as a space for contemplation in our cultures and others.
Contributing authors include: Homero Aridjis, James Aronson, Tessa Bielecki, Alberto Búrquez Montijo, Francisco Cantú, Douglas Christie, Paul Dayton, Alison Hawthorne Deming, Father David Denny, Exequiel Ezcurra, Thomas Lowe Fleischner, Jack Loeffler, Ellen McMahon, Rubén Martínez, Curt Meine, Alberto Mellado Moreno, Paul Mirocha, Gary Paul Nabhan, Ray Perotti, Larry Stevens, Stephen Trimble, Octaviana V. Trujillo, Benjamin T. Wilder, Andy Wilkinson, Ofelia Zepeda
WORLDCAT https://www.worldcat.org/title/1200027671
SPEAKER: Gary Paul Nabhan Gary Paul Nabhan is an internationally-celebrated nature writer, agrarian activist, ethnobiologist, Ecumenical Franciscan Brother, and author whose work has focused primarily on the interaction of biodiversity and cultural diversity in the arid binational Southwest. He is considered a pioneer in the local food movement and the heirloom seed saving movement. He lives with his wife Laurie Monti in Patagonia, Arizona.
VIDEOS: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjkiWIgzmt8
Our video is a You Tube of a presentation Gary Nabhan made to the Natural History Institute in March 2022. (Go past the introduction to where Gary speaks and the sound will get easier to understand.)
ARTICLES:
https://www.garynabhan.com/news/2022/09/can-the-sights-and-sounds-of-nature-make-you-feel-better/
https://www.garynabhan.com/news/2022/05/theres-more-to-that-monsoon-smell-than-meets-the-nose/
JANUARY 11, 2023
BOOK: “End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America” by Yale University Professor Greg Grandin, is a Pulitzer Prize winner (2020) and a groundbreaking book on border history.
In The End of the Myth, Grandin explores the meaning of the frontier throughout the full sweep of U.S. history … for centuries, he shows, America’s constant expansion … served as a ‘gate of escape,’ helping to deflect domestic political and economic conflicts outward. But this deflection meant that the country’s problems, from racism to inequality, were never confronted directly. Now, Grandin posits, with our U.S.-Mexico border issues as well as other domestic conflicts, this frontier is slamming shut, bringing political passions that had long been directed elsewhere back home. The border “… will survive as a rallying point, an allegorical tombstone marking the end of American exceptionalism.”
We were deeply honored to have this renowned historian join us this month. His book is a comprehensive, illuminating and unsettling retelling of American history as the story moves toward our nation’s current border and humanitarian crises. Fifty-three attendees donned scholar’s caps, opened our minds and dug in; it was a wild and fascinating ride. We were also delighted to share the session with two university classes of BCA-member professors. Thanks to all!
SPEAKER: Dr. Greg Grandin
Greg Grandin, Yale history professor, is the author of seven books, including The Blood of Guatemala, which won the Latin American Studies Association’s Award for best book published on Latin America in any discipline. Grandin has published widely, in The Nation, where he is a member of the editorial board, the London Review of Books, the New Republic, NACLA’s Report on the Americas, and the New York Times, among other venues. He is a regular guest on Democracy Now!
VIDEOS: Greg Grandin on “The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America” by Democracy Now!
ARTICLES: When the Frontier Becomes the Wall by Francisco Cantu, in the New Yorker
December 14, 2022
December’s selection was "Feels Like Home: A Song for the Sonora Borderlands," by Linda Ronstadt with Lawrence Downs, and photographs by Bill Steen, who was our presenter.
Bill Steen grew up on both sides of the border; spending much of his childhood in Banámichi, Sonora, and is no stranger to culinary culture on both sides of the border. Longtime friends of the Ronstadt family, Bill and Athena's home has hosted decades of musical and literary gatherings with them in the preparation of this book and all the years and materials leading up to it. Thirty-three participants shared a fascinating conversation with Bill, as well as some great ideas for holiday culinary and cultural adventures.
"In Feels Like Home, Grammy award-winning singer Linda Ronstadt effortlessly evokes the magical panorama of the high desert, a landscape etched by sunlight and carved by wind, offering a personal tour built around meals and memories of the place where she came of age. Growing up the granddaughter of Mexican immigrants and a descendant of Spanish settlers near northern Sonora, Ronstadt’s intimate new memoir celebrates the marvelous flavors and indomitable people on both sides of what was once a porous border whose denizens were happy to exchange recipes and gather around campfires to sing the ballads that shaped Ronstadt’s musical heritage.
Get this book from your local Indie store if you can; also available in local libraries.
VIDEOS:
1. “La Herencia de las Viudas” and the specific video “La Autentica Carne Asada de Sonora.”
2. Trailer of an inspirational hour-long film, “Los Cenzontles” It is mentioned in the book on page 189.
“In this documentary by award-winning director and producer James Keach, we ride with Ronstadt, musician Jackson Browne, and a busload of Cenzontles from Arizona to the little town of Ban´åmichi in Sonora, Mexico, where Ronstadt’s grandfather was born. . . . a song-soaked, foot-stomping trip straight to the heart of what it means to be mexican, and to be American, and the complex joy of being both at the same time.”
FULL MOVIE VERSION: ($14.99) You Tube , ($9.99) Amazon
NOVEMBER 9, 2022
November’s selection, “Somewhere We Are Human: Authentic Voices on Migration, Survival, and New Beginnings” is edited by Reyna Grande and Sonia Guiñansaca. We are incredibly honored to have both of these accomplished, talented, and deeply committed individuals with us for our Zoom meeting. It includes selections from 41 writers and artists. We were incredibly honored to have both of these accomplished, talented, and deeply committed individuals with us for our Zoom meeting.
“Created entirely by undocumented or formerly undocumented migrants, Somewhere We Are Human is a journey of memory and yearning from people newly arrived in the US, those who have been here for decades, and those who have ultimately chosen to leave or were deported. Touching on themes of race, class, gender, nationality, sexuality, politics, and parenthood, Somewhere We Are Human reveals how joy, hope, perseverance, and dreams can take root in the toughest soil and bloom in the harshest conditions.”
BOOK: “Somewhere We Are Human: Authentic Voices on Migration, Survival, and New Beginnings”
Available on: Amazon or WorldCat Libraries
Reyna Grande, born in Mexico, is the author of bestselling memoirs, "The Distance Between Us” and "A Dream Called Home." She writes about immigration, family separation, language trauma, and the price of the American Dream.
Sonia Guiñansaca, born in Ecuador and a Kichwa’Kañari, is an internationally acclaimed poet, activist, and cultural strategist, helping build national undocumented organizations and cofounding programs by and for undocumented artists and writers.
Available on: Amazon or WorldCat Libraries
“Created entirely by undocumented or formerly undocumented migrants, Somewhere We Are Human is a journey of memory and yearning from people newly arrived in the US, those who have been here for decades, and those who have ultimately chosen to leave or were deported. Touching on themes of race, class, gender, nationality, sexuality, politics, and parenthood, Somewhere We Are Human reveals how joy, hope, perseverance, and dreams can take root in the toughest soil and bloom in the harshest conditions.”
OCTOBER 12, 2022
Jenn Budd joined us by Zoom as we explored her book, “Against the Wall: My Journey from Border Patrol Agent to Immigrant Rights Activist.” This memoir presents her time as a senior patrol agent and an intelligence agent with the U.S. Border Patrol from 1995 to 2001, her resignation, and her many recent roles in the field of immigrant rights.
“Her journey offers a vital perspective on the unfolding moral crisis of our time. She also gives harrowing testimony about rape culture, white privilege, women in law enforcement, LGBTQ issues, mental illness, survival and forgiveness.”
“…Raw and truthful, no one escapes judgment, not even Budd, who searches deep within herself to examine her own prejudices as a white southerner, and the role she played as a Border Patrol agent."
BOOK: “Against the Wall: My Journey from Border Patrol Agent to Immigrant Rights Activist” by Jenn Budd.
Available on: Amazon or WorldCat Libraries
Excellent topics & interviews on U.S.-Mexico border issues: https://www.theborderchronicle.com/podcast
August 10, 2022
Our August topic was Life on the Border for multi-generational “Bordercanos;” people who have lived for many generations on either or both sides of the Mexico/U.S. border. Their perspectives, life experiences, sense of place … all this was explored.
SPEAKER: Dr. Toni Muñoz-Hunt, who left a fashion career to work in and for her communities. She is currently an associate professor at the University of Texas and has dedicated much of her time to deconstructing her role as a ninth-generation Bordercanx. Her passion for this geopolitical, geocultural, and geographical location of New Mexico and Texas where she was born and grew up is transparent.
Toni is also founder of a nonprofit organization providing funding and services to underserved women and children in Texas, the mother of two young children, and director of the Center for US-Latin America Initiatives (CUSLAI) Community Digital Archive project, which interviews and photographs multigenerational, double-hybridized Border families living along the US-Mexico Border. She is also an author, and her winning publication of “Border Sisters” in Blue Mesa Review will be included in our reading list. Her website is: https://www.tonimunozhunt.com/
BOOK: “Borderlands / La Frontera: The New Mestiza,” by Gloria Anzaldúa. 5th Edition – March 2022 “A collection of theoretical texts, memoir, and poetry, this has become not just Anzaldúa’s most famous work, but a foundational text in Chicana/o, gay and lesbian, feminist, and American studies. The book centers around the idea of a “borderland,” or a place where divisions imposed by those in power breed violence as well as ambiguity and the possibility for change. Borderlands / La Frontera remaps our understanding of what a "border" is, presenting it not as a simple divide between here and there, us and them, but as a psychic, social, and cultural terrain that we inhabit, and that inhabits all of us.”
Available on Amazon & WorldCat libraries
ARTICLES:
1. “Border Sisters,” in Issue 40 of Blue Mesa Review
2. “Mericans” by Sandra Cisneros
3. “Living on the Border: A Wound that Will Not Heal”
VIDEOS:
July 13, 2022
Our topic this month was Southwest Desert-Adapted Architecture, with historic and current examples. We focused on a number of true-to-the-land desert building approaches, from small-scale traditional adobe and cob to larger modern designs.
SPEAKER: Athena Swentzell Steen, native materials designer/builder/ artist who grew up on the Santa Clara Pueblo. She's the daughter of Rina Swentzell who was an architect, potter, teacher, author, historian and lecturer. and sister of Roxanne Swentzell, famed pueblo potter and permaculturalist. Athena and husband Bill Steen and their three sons run the Canelo Project near Elgin, Arizona.
In February, 2023, we will follow this presentation with a field trip to the Canelo Project, an operating school on building with native materials.
BOOK (Optional and excellent): "Built By Hand: Vernacular Buildings Around the World" by Elko Komatsu.
ARTICLES/ESSAYS: Move through a Puebloan perspective of space and structure with "An Understated Sacredness." Contrast indigenous building design with conventional western design in "Conflicting Landscape Values: The Santa Clara Pueblo and Day School [Vision, Culture, and Landscape]." Learn about Rina Swentzell and her perspectives on historic preservation and building through "On Her Own Terms." Together they present a rich and thought-provoking foundation of relationship to built spaces.
VIDEOS;
In this Zoom interview of Athena Swentzell Steen by a European architecture class, Athena goes through her slideshow "Rooted in Clay," in fascinating detail. The students' questions are revealing, too. This video gives an overview of Rina, Athena, the traditional building principles and techniques they use in Mexico and U.S., and current perspectives.
"Raised from Earth" is a fun and inspiring family video produced by Patagonia (10 minutes)
Check out the website of Canelo Project where the family lives, works, and holds workshops.
June 8, 2022
We explored the history and mythology of “Aztlan,” which establishes the Aztecs as a Mesoamerican culture arriving from the north - what is now our Southwestern United States - into “Mexico” before forming their city of Tenochititlan, which later was destroyed by Spanish conquistadors and built upon as Mexico City. The notion of Aztlan became central to the Chicano movement as synonymous with Mexican Indigenous belief in their ancient homeland in the American Southwest.
SPEAKER: Daniel Cooper Alarcon, author of "The Aztec Palimpsest." He is currently an Associate Professor of English at the U of A. BCA Board Member Jan Saunders also spoke, discussing the concept of “Nepantla,” a Nahuatl word and a concept used in Chicano/Latino culture, representing a state of “in-between-ness.”
BOOK: "Aztlán: Essays on the Chicano Homeland," (revised 2017) published by University of New Mexico Press. This compilation of 22 academicians and authors is the best overview of all aspects of the considerations through time of the mythical homeland of the Mexica.
VIDEO: Los Aztecas: Capítulo I, El Origen (Documental Completo) The video, in Spanish with English subtitles, is a fast-paced search for Aztlán that starts in the heart of Tenochtitlan and takes us to the U.S. Southwest and back down to Mexico City. It is part one of a further investigation. Make sure that, if it isn't on, you select "English" in the subtitles under the Settings.
ARTICLES:
1. Aztlán: From Mythos to Logos in the American Southwest, (2019) by Toni Muñoz-Hunt. A scholarly but thorough insight into Aztlan and its link to the Mexica identity in the United States.
2. Beyond Aztlán: Latina/o/x Students Let Go of Their Mythic Homeland (2019) by Jacqueline Hidalgo. An excellent if brief overview of the linkages between "Chicano" and "Aztlan" and their interconnections, history, and current relevance.
May 11, 2022
May’s readings and interview focused on borderlands poetry, with Javier Zamora, a Salvadorean poet in Tucson who has emerged into public focus with his award winning poetry book “Unaccompanied,” and his upcoming book “Solito” both dealing with his migration from El Salvador when he was nine. His poetry has appeared in Ploughshares, New Republic, American Poetry Review and elsewhere. He is currently a Radcliffe Fellow at Harvard University. Zamora met with us to discuss our questions after reading “Unaccompanied.”
ARTICLE: A Wider Patch of Sky, a compelling conversation between Javier Zamora and author/former Border Patrol agent Francisco Cantu, reflecting on their travels together to re-discover the point at the U.S./Mexico border where Zamora crossed as a child.
APRIL 13, 2022
In April we focused on children’s and youth literature, with prize-winning book selections that address the difficult topics of borderlands with age-appropriate investigation that reaches out to touch kids at levels they can understand and relate to.
SPEAKER: Scott Buchanan, who has lived most of his life in Prescott and Tucson Arizona, and is now a children’s Librarian at the Mt. Lebanon Public Library in Pittsburgh, PA. We discussed the sensitive nature of discussing difficult subjects like migration and asylum with children, as well as the value of children’s literature to adults. The two award-winning children’s books selected were “Land of the Cranes” by Aida Salazar, winner of the International Latino Book Award among others, and “The Last Cuentista” by Donna Barba Higuera, winner of the John Newberry Medal and Time’s Best books of the year.
March 2022
We took time off in order to staff our BCA booth at the Tucson Festival of Books on March 12/13 at the University of Arizona campus. This is the third largest book festival in the country, averaging 125,000 visitors. To say it’s one of the most exciting, educational, and inspirational events of the year is an understatement. SEE YOU NEXT YEAR!
February 9, 2022
Book: “Build Bridges, Not Walls … A Journey to a World Without Borders” by Todd Miller
VIDEO: "The Human Cost of Hardening the U.S. Border," focuses on Sonora Mexico while covering the whole border briefly. It interviews Todd Miller as immigration authority, as well as numerous other people on both sides of the border, ending with an inspiring interview with a Tohono O'odham family living on the Mexico side.
SPEAKER: Todd Miller, author and independent journalist, has been reporting from international border zones for over twenty-five years. (Also read by BLFC, his “Storming the Wall: Climate Change, Migration, and Homeland Security”)
Other Resources by Miller: a regular, interactive border journalism discussion thread and photo/audio program: The Border Chronicle
“The stories of the humble people of the earth Miller documents ask us to also tear down the walls in our hearts and in our heads. What proliferates in the absence of these walls and in spite of them, Miller writes, is the natural state of things centered on kindness and compassion.” Nick Estes. Miller’s compassion, coupled with clear-eyed understanding of border issues, makes his offerings vital to increased awareness of our nearby border along with others around the globe.
January 12, 2022
BOOK: “The Forgotten Botanist … Sara Plummer Lemmon’s Life of Science and Art” by Wynne Brown
VIDEO: “Sara Plummer Lemmon,” her story then and now. For a link to this fascinating video, email lifesongsrc@gmail.com.
SPEAKER: Wynne Brown, author, editor, graphic designer, pre-publication consultant
This fascinating account of the namesake for Mount Lemmon in the Catalina Range near Tucson is a perspective of grit, inspiration, and a woman’s strength and vision. It is both a historical insight into Sonoran desert and stalwart hearts of over a century ago, and a forward-looking passion for qualities that mark us now as explorers and innovators with dogged determination to make our visions see fruition. The competence of Wynne as storyteller and visionary is a strong accompanying theme complimenting her extraordinary subject.
November 11, 2021
Our November 11th meeting will bring us to the Southwest mountains and the Sky Islands, with guest presenter Jeff Babson, local naturalist and owner of Sky Island Tours.
October 13, 2021
BOOK: (Your choice to buy/read: includes four essays regarding ethnic food and land practices):
The Pueblo Food Experience Cookbook: Whole Foods of our Ancestors by Roxanne Swentzell and Patricia Perea
October's meeting focused upon cultural food traditions … eating as investment in self, family, society and land. The book and video selections wereexpressive of Pueblo and Hispanic cultures and permaculture practices, but also reflectied on our own relationship with traditions around food: how these connect with tradition, climate, and future health of all.
We visited with a representative from the San Xavier Co-op Farm https://www.sanxaviercoop.org
September 8, 2021
In our September session we return to our focus on the environment, seeds, and foods.
BOOK: Food from the Radical Center: Healing Our Land and Communities by Gary Paul Nabhan (Patagonia, AZ)
Nabhan's 2018 book includes compelling stories to highlight grass-roots efforts to change behaviors by initiating programs that support local food movements that enhance cultural and environmental sustainability. CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION
July 14, 2021
We'll take a bit of a summer break from nonfiction in JULY and read:
The Good Map of All Things by Alberto Rios
June 9, 2021
For our JUNE meeting, we'll continue our focus on environment with two books on water:
Where the Water Goes by David Owens and The Secret Knowledge of Water by Craig Childs
April 14, 2021
BOOK: Cloak and Jaguar: Following a Cat from Desert to Courtroom, By Janya Brun
ARTICLES:
AZ Daily Star: Study: Arizona could support more jaguars in a broader area
National Geographic: Why a new jaguar sighting near the Arizona-Mexico border gives experts hope
VIDEO: Where Jaguars Roam
Jaguar Project: https://www.northernjaguarproject.org/
SPEAKER: Janya Brun
For more information, contact Suzy Webber, 520.398.3229
March 10, 2021
Continuing on the theme of the history of the borderlands, invited guest & BCA Program Director Alex La Pierre will hold a discussion of the indicated books and offer a presentation on the heritage of our neighbor, the Mexican state of Sonora.
BOOKS:
Sonora: Its Geographical Personality Author: Robert C. West
Where the Dove Calls Author: Thomas E. Sheridan
FILM: "Favores Celestiales" Padre Eusebio Kino Documentary via YouTube
February 10, 2021
For this first quarter of 2021, we are focusing on the history of the borderlands and who better than Program Director Alex La Pierre to lead us? Alex will be giving a presentation on the Pilgrimage to Magdalena, and include a showing of the BCA’s brand-new documentary on the tradition.
January 13, 2021
Our next meeting on January 13, 2021 will follow a theme of culture through personal and public history, featuring discussions with BLFC member Rita Cantu and her son, Francisco (Paco) Cantu, author of “The Line Becomes a River,” both long-time friends of BCA. We’ll be reading new writings by Paco, as well as a portion of Rita’s memoir exploring family, ancestry, and the reckoning of story, monuments and mythology in the perception of a place and a people.
READINGS: Excerpts from Rita Cantu's upcoming memoir, Yearner's Journey (available via email)
Sounds of Neplanta, Exploration of Selina’s Legacy to Music and Culture, Francisco Cantu, VQR Journal
For Context: Racism on Public Land -AND- Story of a People, The Harvard Gazette
November 11, 2020
BOOK: “Are we not foreigners here? Nationalism in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands”
Author: Jeffrey Schulze
Film: Sonora
October 14, 2020
Book: “Tales from the Desert Borderland”
Author: Lawrence Taylor
Film: El Mar La Mar
September 9, 2020
Book: “The Book of Rosy: A Mother’s Story of Separation at the Border”
Author: Rosayra Pablo Cruz and Julie S. Collazo
Film: Human Flow
August 12, 2020
Book: “Migration to Prison: America’s Obsession with Locking Up Immigrants”
Author: César Cuauhtémoc García Hernández
July 8, 2020
Film: Sin Nombre