Category Archives: Library Events

Transforming Our World: Art & Self-Care

 


December 3rd at 3:00 p.m. – Virtual Panel on Art and Self-Care
[Cover image: Marcelina Gonzales, Summer of ’97 and El Show de Cristina, Oil tinted resin collaged on wood, 18.5 x 23.5 x 3 in., 2019.]

The South Texas College Library Art Gallery presents “Transforming Our World” a series that examines the ways in which physical and social changes to our environment have influenced the work that some artists create. Each first Thursday of the month at 3 p.m., the library will produce a lecture that discusses the many facets of our surroundings that impact each of us: our natural environment, the upcoming election, social movements, and personal health. Each conversation will connect a visual artist whose work has been influenced by these changes with other professionals and will include both local and non-local perspectives.

On December 3, 2020, at 3:00 p.m., Aimaloghi Eromosele, Community Organizer, Esther Garcia, Librarian, Marcelina Gonzales, Visual Artist, and Gina Otvos will discuss self-care and personal health in a virtual panel. In today’s climate regarding Covid-19 and social distancing, a lot has been said about the term “social” and “distancing” and how inadequate that term is to describe where we’re at. Not only are we physically distant, we are also socially unable to connect easily considering the hoops it takes to set up a digital hangout. What does the work of connecting mean today? Are there processes we are losing? Can we rebuild those social connections? Can we do it through art or creative expression? Does community play a role in self-care? Join us to explore these topics.

The South Texas College Library Art Gallery Program organizes exhibitions and educational programs to engage student understanding of art and its role in culture, support the academic curriculum, and inspire continued education through direct engagement with artists, scholars, and original works of art.

For more information, contact gotvos@southtexascollege.edu or visit https://library.southtexascollege.edu/libraryartgallery.

 

Social Featured Image

Transforming Our World: Art & Social Movements

Artwork by Josue Ramirez
November 5th at 3:00 p.m. – Virtual Panel on Art in Social Movements

[Cover image: Josué Ramírez]

The South Texas College Library Art Gallery presents “Transforming Our World” a series that examines the ways in which physical and social changes to our environment have influenced the work that some artists create. Each first Thursday of the month at 3 p.m., the library will produce a lecture that discusses the many facets of our surroundings that impact each of us: our natural environment, the upcoming election, social movements, and personal health. Each conversation will connect a visual artist whose work has been influenced by these changes with other professionals and will include both local and non-local perspectives.

On November 5, 2020, at 3:00 p.m., Library Art Gallery Coordinator Gina Otvos will speak with Josué Ramírez, Artist and Cultural Organizer for NetaRGV and Dr. Theresa Gatling and Marsha Terry, Co-founders of Village in the Valley in a virtual panel about how art can help us understand and contextualize social movements.

Panel Poster

The South Texas College Library Art Gallery Program organizes exhibitions and educational programs to engage student understanding of art and its role in culture, support the academic curriculum, and inspire continued education through direct engagement with artists, scholars, and original works of art.

For more information, contact gotvos@southtexascollege.edu or visit https://library.southtexascollege.edu/libraryartgallery.

Family Reading Night 2020

South Texas College Mid-Valley Campus Library will once again host the annual “Family Reading Night” event on Wednesday, October 21, 2020, from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. in Parking Lot 4 (outside of the Library’s west side entrance by the book drop).

This year we have transformed the event into a drive-by parade, and are requiring face coverings as well as following social distancing guidelines for the well-being of students, faculty, staff, and community users.  The night’s festivities include a book distribution by South Texas Literacy Coalition via curbside.

This free event, which is open to the public, is held in conjunction with Reading Week. We know that the event cannot be structured the same as past years, but we believe this event is very important and have developed a plan to continue this tradition.

“We want to help children develop a love of reading and to encourage Valley parents to read with their children,” said Lillian Carrillo, Mid-Valley Campus Librarian. “Our college’s libraries are a gateway to the community, and we hope that participants will not only take advantage of these fun activities, but also learn more about some of the great services that the college has to offer.”

The library is located in Building E1.200 at 400 N. Border in Weslaco. For more information about the event contact Lillian Carrillo at 956-447-6663.

Family Reading Night 2020

Transforming Our World: Through Poetry

In conjunction with the Library Art Gallery’s virtual artist lecture series, “Transforming Our World: The Changing Climate,” we will continue the conversation through a series of live poetry workshops, and we invite members of the community to submit poetry throughout the Fall semester. One of the overarching themes of both series is how creative expression can be a means of understanding the changes around us and coping with stress, especially in our current climate of the Covid-19 pandemic.

At these live poetry workshop sessions, attendees will have the opportunity to reflect on the changes they are seeing and experiencing, and try their hand at creating “flash” or spontaneous poetry in response to a prompt.  The three poetry workshops will center around the first three themes explored by the virtual artist lectures:  Environmental, Political, and Social changes.

Join the conversation at the dates and times below:

  • September 10th, at 3:00pm – Environmental Change – View recording on YouTube.
  • October 8th, at 3:00pm – Political Change – View the recording on Facebook.
  • November 12th, at 3:00pm – Social Change – View the recording on Facebook.

Additionally, STC Library will be producing an anthology of community poetry titled, “Transforming Our World: The Changing Climate,” that will include poetry submitted by students, faculty, staff, and the community.  Poetry submissions will be accepted on the themes of “Environmental Change,” “Political Change,” and “Social Change,” during periods listed below. Submissions will then be compiled into a digital anthology and made available for download.

September 10 – December 10:  Poetry Submission Form for Environmental Theme
October 8 – December 10:  Poetry Submission form for Political Theme
November 12 – December 10:  Poetry Submission form for Social Theme

Note: Submission forms for each of the three themes will be available during the corresponding dates.

Poetry Submission Guidelines:

  • One poetry submission per person, per theme.
  • Authors must be a minimum of age 6 to submit their work.
  • Poetry submissions must relate to the given themes.
  • Poetry submissions must not be previously published.
  • Poetry submissions must be appropriate for all ages – no foul language, no graphic/explicit depictions of violence or sex will be accepted.
  • By submitting a poem, you and/or your legal guardian agree to allow STC Library to include your work in the anthology, and to make reproductions in part or in whole with author credit as needed for marketing and promotional activities related to the anthology, without compensation.
  • Submissions must be typewritten.
  • Poems up to fifty (50) lines maximum will be accepted, and must not exceed this limit.
  • Only the first 300 poems submitted that meet all the above criteria will be accepted, per theme.
  • Poetry submissions by STC students, faculty, or staff will have an indicator in the anthology.

 

American Sign Language

Interview with American Sign Language and Interpreting Studies Program Faculty

South Texas College Librarian Angelica Maria Garcia had the opportunity to sit down with Jovonne Delgado and Jorge Solis, faculty members from American Sign Language and Interpreting Studies Program to learn more about the different pathways one can take if interested in obtaining a certificate in Deaf Support Specialist or Trilingual Interpreter Certificate or an Associate of Applied Science in American Sign Language and Interpreting Studies Specialization.

 

Interested in taking the journey through the American Sign Language and Interpreting Studies program? Find out more on information on their department website!

Learning Art Techniques

Learning Art Techniques with Author/Illustrator-Carolyn Dee Flores

Please grab a comfortable seat, a pen, notebook, and sit down to enjoy this video presentation with Author/Illustrator Carolyn Dee Flores.  The video is tailored to Art students at South Texas College, a professional sharing her expertise about different techniques and ideas.  The video is approximately 60 minutes in length.

https://carolyndeeflores.com/

https://youtu.be/e_0K0SS0LQo

Texas Poet Laureate-Emmy Perez

Emmy Pérez will visit three of South Texas College’s campuses, starting with a visit on Monday, April 13, 2020, at 10:00 am,  at the STARR Campus Library Event Room K1.200, Tuesday, April 14, 2020 she will visit Mid-Valley Campus Library BI Lab E1.106  at 1:00 pm and concluding at Pecan Campus Library Rainbow Room at 6:00 pm.

Emmy Pérez, Texas Poet Laureate 2020, has lived in the Texas borderlands for the past 19+ years, the first six in El Paso where she has family roots before she moved to McAllen where she currently lives. She is the author of the poetry collections With the River on Our Face (University of Arizona Press) and Solstice (Swan Scythe Press). A volume of her New and Selected poems is forthcoming from TCU Press, Texas Poet Laureate series.

For more information about these events please contact Angelica Maria Garcia  at (956)872-2277 or amgarcia@southtexascollege.edu.

Jovita Gonzalez Lecture Series Presents: Dr. Brenda Sendejo

Writer and scholar Dr. Brenda Sendejo will be visiting South Texas College this March during our Jovita Gonzalez Lecture Series.

Dr. Sendejo will visit three of South Texas College’s campuses, starting with a visit on March 4, 2020, at 1:00 pm, she will be at the Mid-Valley Campus Library, then she will visit Pecan Campus Library Rainbow Room at 6:00 pm. On March 5, 2020 at 10:00 am, Dr. Sendejo will conclude her visit at the Starr County Campus Library.

Dr. Sendejo is a Chicana/Tejana feminist anthropologist who researches spiritual activism and the Chicana feminist movement in Texas. Her book manuscript in progress is titled, The Face of God Has Changed: Chicana Feminism and the Politics of Spirituality in the Borderlands. Sendejo employs feminist and decolonial pedagogies and methodologies as an educator-scholar and Director of the Latina History Project, an intergenerational oral history/digital archival project that documents Chicana/Latina feminism and activism in Texas since the 1960s. She is a contributor to Chicana Movidas: New Narratives of Activism and Feminism in the Movement Era, edited by Maylei Blackwell, Maria Cotera, and Dionne Espinoza (UT Press, 2018). In that essay Sendejo examines the intellectual genealogy of Chicana feminism and its roots in Austin, Texas. Sendejo currently serves as Associate Professor and Chair of Feminist Studies at Southwestern University, and affiliate faculty in Anthropology, Latin American and Border Studies, and Race and Ethnicity Studies

Her research explores how prominent Mexican American writers of Mexican descent, such as Jovita González, used literature to respond to the dominative history of the United States.

For more information about these events please contact Angelica Maria Garcia  at (956)872-2277 or amgarcia@southtexascollege.edu.