María Herrera-Sobek, Ph.D., Associate Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity and Academic Policy; Luis Leal Endowed Chair; Professor, Chicana and Chicano Studies, University of California-Santa Barbara; and Fellow of the American Folklore Society

Dr. María Herrera-Sobek, published over 175 articles, book chapters, reviews, poetry, and books including The Bracero Experience: Elitelore Versus Folklore; The Mexican Corrido: A Feminist Analysis; Northward Bound: The Mexican Immigrant Experience in Ballad and Song; Beyond Stereotypes: A Critical Analysis of Chicana Literature; Chicana Creativity and Criticism: Charting New Frontiers in Chicana Literature (with Helena María Viramontes); Gender and Print Culture: New Perspectives on International Ballad Studies; Reconstructing a Chicano/a Literary Heritage: Hispanic Colonial Literature of the Southwest; Chicana (W)rites on Word and Film (with Helena María Viramontes); Saga de México (with Seymour Menton); Culture Across Borders: The Popular Culture of Mexican Immigration (with David Maciel ); Cultura: Al otro lado de la frontera: Immigración y cultura popular (with David Maciel); Recovering the U.S. Hispanic Literary Heritage: Vol. III (with Virginia Sánchez-Korrol); Power, Race and Gender in Academe: Strangers in the Tower? (with Shirley Geok-lin Lim); Santa Barraza: Artist of the Borderlands; Chicano Renaissance: Contemporary Cultural Trends (with David Maciel and Isidro D. Ortiz); and Chicano Folklore: A Handbook (2006).  Presently, Dr. Herrera-Sobek working on a book Constructing Nationhood and Ethnicity: La Malinche, the Virgin of Guadalupe, and La Llorona.  She is a Guest Editor for Special Issue on Chicano Literature Nerter (University of La Laguna, Canary Islands) and also she was Guest Editor for two Special Issues on Chicano Literature for the Journal of American Studies, Turkey (No. 12, 2000 and No 23, Spring, 2006).  Dr. Herrera-Sobek received her Ph.D. Latin American Literature (minor in Latin American Folklore), UCLA; M.A. Latin American Studies, UCLA; B.A. Chemistry, Arizona State University. Past appointments: Professor, University of California, Irvine (21 years); Visiting Professor, Folklore and Mythology Program, Harvard University (fall 1992 and fall 1996); Stanford University 1991-92.

Informal Dialogue with María Herrera-Sobek—2:00-3:00 p.m.

Sherman Alexie, A Spokane/Coeur d’Alene Indian, Author, Poet, Screenwriter—Seattle, Washington

Sherman Alexie “...teaches, entertains and inspires — interculturally, intergenerationally and with a flair for taking you to a creative playground that is both familiar and unfamiliar to all of us. A prolific novelist, poet and screenplay writer, Alexie has been hailed as one of the best young writers of his generation. The New Yorker named him one of the top 20 writers for the 21st Century. His talent and voice shine brightly, far beyond the pages of his work. Men’s Journal called him “the world’s first fast-talking, wisecracking, mediagenic American Indian superstar.” A gifted orator, Sherman Alexie won the World Heavyweight Championship Poetry Bout four years in a row (1998 to 2001). Sherman tells tales of contemporary American Indian life laced with razor-sharp humor, unsettling candor and biting wit. He reshapes our myths and stereotypes by speaking his mind on a wide range of issues — from race relations, religion and politics to homophobia, war and morality. A Spokane/Coeur d’Alene Indian, Alexie grew up on the Spokane Indian Reservation in Washington. As a college student, he landed in a poetry-writing class and his professor quickly recognized his “intensity of language, passion and energy.” Upon the publication of The Business of Fancydancing, his first collection of poetry, The New York Times Book Review described him as “one of the major lyric voices of our time.”  Since then, Alexie has authored eleven books of poetry, several collections of short stories, two novels and numerous works for magazines. He wrote the screenplay for and produced the feature film Smoke Signals, based on his book, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven. The film premiered at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival, winning both the Audience Award and Filmmakers Trophy. His first novel, Reservation Blues, won Booklist’s Editors Choice Award for Fiction. Indian Killer was a New York Times Notable Book and The Toughest Indian in the World won the 2001 PEN/Malamud award, honoring excellence in the art of storytelling. In his latest book, Ten Little Indians, a national bestseller and Publishers Weekly Book of the Year, Alexie’s stories are driven by a haunting lyricism and naked candor that cut to the heart of the human experience. In 2002, Alexie released his directorial film debut, The Business of Fancydancing, which the film won many awards, including the Outstanding Screenwriting Award at Outfest. He is currently working on a screenplay adaptation of The Toughest Indian in the World, which he will direct and co-produce. In 2003 Sherman Alexie received Washington State University’s Highest Alumnus Award, recognizing the importance of his Native American voice to a broad audience. His next book (Fall 2007) is The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, a "coming-of-age, interracial comedy" for young adults based on his first year at an all-white high school. With his humorous, revealing and exuberant works of art, Alexie compels audiences to see the world for all of pitfalls and its possibilities.

Informal Dialogue with Sherman Alexie and book signing—10:00–11:30 a.m.

Vijay Prashad, Ph.D., George and Martha Kellner Professor in South Asian History, and Director, International Studies Program, Trinity College—Hartford, Connecticut

Vijay Prashad is the George and Martha Kellner Professor of South Asian History and Director of the International Studies Program at Trinity College. His most recent books are The Darker Nations: A People’s History of the Third World (New York: The New Press) and Dispatches from Latin America: Experiments Against Neoliberalism (co-edited with Teo Ballve, Boston: South End Press). Vijay Prashad is the author of ten other books, including two selected by the Village Voice as books of the year Karma of Brown Folk (2000) and Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting: Afro-Asian Connections and the Myth of Cultural Purity (2001). He is on the board of the Center for Third World Organizing (Oakland), United for a Fair Economy (Boston) and National Priorities Project (Northampton). Vijay writes a monthly column for Frontline (India), ZNET and Counterpunch. The recent published ZNet commentaries by Vijay Prashad: Northampton’s Book of Peace (September 18, 2006); The Ring Around China (September 1, 2006); Security (June 6, 2006); The Lobby (May 4, 2006); The Ugly American (March 6, 2006). 

Informal Dialogue with Vijay Prashad and Book Signing—10:00–11:30 a.m.

Lani Guinier, Legal Professor, Law School, Harvard University; and Civil Rights Expert —Cambridge, Massachusetts

In 1998, Lani Guinier became the first black woman to be appointed to a tenured professorship at Harvard Law School. Before joining the faculty at Harvard, she was a tenured professor for ten years at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. During the 1980s, she was head of the voting rights project at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, and served in the Civil Rights Division during the Carter administration as special assistant to then‑Assistant Attorney General Drew S. Days. Guinier came to public attention when she was nominated by President Bill Clinton in 1993 to head the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice, only to have her name withdrawn without a confirmation hearing. Guinier turned that incident into a powerful personal and political memoir, Lift Every Voice: Turning a Civil Rights Setback into a New Vision of Social Justice. Dean of Yale Law School Anthony Kronman calls Lift Every Voice a “moving personal testimony, a story of dignity and principle and hope, from which every reader can take heart.” While a member of the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania Law School, Guinier investigated the experience of women in law school, leading to the publication of a book, Becoming Gentlemen: Women, Law School and Institutional Change. She and her co‑authors found that women were not graduating with top honors, although women and men came to the school with virtually identical credentials. The author of many articles and op‑ed pieces on democratic theory, political representation, educational equity, and issues of race and gender, Guinier has written The Tyranny of the Majority (Free Press, 1994) about issues of political representation; Who’s Qualified? (Beacon Press, 2001) written with Susan Sturm about moving beyond affirmative action to reconsider the ways in which colleges admit all students; and The Miner’s Canary (Harvard Press, 2002), written with Gerald Torres about the experience of people of color as a warning or “canary” signaling larger institutional inequities. A graduate of Radcliffe College of Harvard University and Yale Law School, Guinier has received numerous awards, including the 1995 Margaret Brent Women Lawyers of Achievement Award from the American Bar Association’s Commission on Women in the Profession; the Champion of Democracy Award from the National Women's Political Caucus; the Rosa Parks Award from the American Association for Affirmative Action; the Harvey Levin Teaching Award, given to her by the 1994 graduating class at the University of Pennsylvania; and the 2002 Sacks‑Freund Teaching Award from Harvard Law School. She is the recipient of eight honorary degrees from schools which include Smith College, Spelman College, Swarthmore College, and the University of the District of Columbia.

Informal Dialogue with Lani Guinier and Book Signing—5:00-6:00 p.m.