Workshop Descriptions
"Escribir sobre los amuletos/Writing About Amulets"--Lead by Kadiri Vaquer Fernandez
In this workshop, writers will be encouraged to reflect on objects like keepsakes, souvenirs, amulets, or lucky charms, how we rely on them for different purposes, and how these artifacts are connected to personal narratives or memories. This workshop is open to anyone, established or aspiring writer, but is especially meant to motivate individuals wanting to tell a story (through prose or verse) that is particularly challenging.
(Break-out Session #1)
"Decolonizing Our Writing--Lead by Odilia Galván Rodríguez
In working towards decolonizing our writing, we must witness how our voices were stifled and or silenced over our lifetime. In and of themselves, these acts of silencing and erasure are traumatic events that happened to us personally and to our family and community members. Even when we’ve censored ourselves or chose not to use our native tongues out of shame or fear of retribution, that too is the effect of colonization.
In this workshop, through discussion and free-writing, we will explore ways to reincorporate our ways of speaking, telling stories, code-switching, and writing in the languages of our ancestors. We may have lost some of our indigenous languages; however, we may begin to remember them by writing freely without worrying about the audience or the gatekeepers.
(Break-out Session #1) & (Break-out Session #2)
"Now Serving Poetry : A Meal in Community" --Led by Las Chingonas
We conceive LAS CHINGONAS as a writing collective, a writing circle where we help each other write beyond our isolation, supporting and empowering each other to bring out our fullest selves in our writing. Each of us will present a half-hour generative writing workshop; Aideed and Carla will present in the first session, while Violeta and Susana will go after lunch.
How to Find a Poem in a Sandia led by Aideed Medina
How to find poetry in the natural world through floricanto. In digesting a Sandia, how do we find the poem within? How does the bocadillo inspire the thought? You're drinking from the water that was rained into the soil, becoming in touch with the roots of the soil, and thus with your own roots. it’s a very basic meditation. In this exercise, I want you to think first of holding: is it a watermelon, is it a peach, is it an elote? What are you reaching for when you’re hungry?
Break-out Session #1 (11:00 to 12:00)
You’re Gonna Need a Recipe for that Main Dish led by Carla Schick
We change recipes according to availability. Food brings us together in celebration and mourning. The structure can be used in poems: Recipes of how to connect with ancestors Recipes for how to love yourself Recipe on how to connect with a recipe or a family member. Let's write!
Break-out Session #1 (11:00 to 12:00)
Why Gorditas are Best Stuffed with Poems led by Violeta Orozco
Kneading gorditas is a parallel process to amasar poemas. How to rebuild a world that we can’t easily access through poetry is similar to how to make a gordita from scratch. It all burns down to getting your hands dirty with masa and poetry. Uncover the relationship between discomfort and worldbuilding. A poem is as messy as masa, it doesn’t have form yet, you have to knead it, knead the words until they become the right texture and the right shape.
Break-out Session #2 (1:30 to 2:30)
Presentation is Everything in the Salad of Words led by Susana Praver-Pérez
Come make a poetic salad by arranging words to give a maximum impact using alliteration, repetition, assonance and other poetic structures. Please bring an unstructured poem of yours that you would like to restructure. The goal is to explore how with short lines the mood is choppy, or how long lines have a different feel or flavor, as well as how punctuation really modifies the flavor and presentation of the poem.
Break-out Session #2 (1:30 to 2:30)
"Every Flavor of Memoir: How to Bring Authentic Life to the Page"--Lead by Janet Rodriguez
Writing memoir involves different kinds of writing muscles than other forms. From memoir in poetry to newer hybrid forms, this workshop will help you diagram your story, find your voice, and forecast an outline for the most important writing project in your life, whether you are just starting to write your family story, or are knee-deep in the process, come and have fun exploring ways of bringing words to life on the page.
Participants will review different forms of memoir, discuss the challenges of writing nonfiction, make a road map for the narrative, and find creative ways to organize significant events and memories. When it’s written well, memoir is more than an account of life, it is life! Come and celebrate the power of the legacy you are leaving behind. Find your voice and tell your story.
Suggested Reading:
The Art of Memoir by Mary Karr
Making an American Family: A Recipe in Five Generations by Janet Rodriguez
(Break-out Session #2)