XXV Celebration Kickoff!

Nuestra Palabra: Latino Writers Have Their Say

Nuestra Palabra: Latino Writers Having Their Say celebrates 25 years! On Wednesday, April 26, Librotraficantes celebrated 25 years of NP with a reception at the Post Houston at the ALMAAHH Texas Gallery. From the heart of Houston, Tony Diaz leads a festive program that included many collaborators and NP alumni. Danza, book readings, and poetry recitals along with powerful testimony gave life to a great celebration that will continue all year long. (Folks listed are part of the programing.)

Monica Villareal (w/ Danza Azteca Taxcayolotl) is an interdisciplinary artist native to Houston. Her art explores ethnic identity, gender roles, migrant and environmental issues. She is a recipient of multiple awards in photography and filmmaking, and has participated in installation and performing art productions organized by Voices Breaking Boundaries, Project Row Houses, Houston Arts Alliance, Multicultural Education and Counseling through the Arts, Santa Fe Arts Institute, and Alabama Song. Monica wears various hats, as the founder of Creative Women Unite, a local feminist arts collaborative and as a traditional Aztec dancer with Danza Azteca Taxcayolot.

José F. Aranda, Jr. is Professor of Chicanx and American Literatures at Rice University. He is the author of When We Arrive: A New Literary History of Mexican America (Arizona, 2003). He has written articles on 19 th century Mexican American literature and the Recovery Project, the future of Chicano/a Studies, and most recently undertaken an investigation of the relationship between modernity and Mexican American writings, entitled The Places of Modernity in Early Mexican American Literature, 1848-1948, University of Nebraska Press, 2022.

Sixto Wagan is the Project Director for the BIPOC Arts Network and Fund. He leads BANF along with a seven-member Steering Committee and a nine-member Accountability and Advisory Council made up of a diverse group of artists, curators, scholars, organizational leaders and foundation partners, who guide goals and priorities.

Leslie Contreras Schwartz is a multi-genre writer, a 2021 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellow, and the 2019-2021 Houston Poet Laureate. She is the author of five collections of poetry, including The Body Cosmos (Mouthfeel Press, 2023); Black Dove / Paloma Negra (FlowerSong Press, 2020), a finalist for 2020 Best Book of Poetry from the Texas Institute of Letters; Fuego (St. Julian Press, 2016); and Nightbloom & Cenote (SJP, 2018), a semi-finalist for the 2017 Tupelo Press Dorset Prize, judged by Ilya Kaminsky.

Bao-Long Chu is a storyteller. Originally from Vietnam, his passion for writing led him to the MFA creative writing program at University of Houston. Chu holds a Bachelor of Arts in English and psychology from Houston Baptist University and a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from the University of Houston Creative Writing Program. Long’s poems and essays have been published in several anthologies, including The New Anthology of American Poetry: Postmodernisms 1950-Present and From Both Sides Now: The Poetry of the Vietnam War and Its Aftermath.

Jasminne Mendez is a Dominican-American poet, playwright, translator and award winning author of several books for children and adults. She is the author of two hybrid memoirs, Island of Dreams (Floricanto Press) and Night-Blooming Jasmin(n)e: Personal Essays and Poetry (Arte Público Press). Her second YA memoir, Islands Apart: Becoming Dominican American (Arte Público Press) is forthcoming in May 2022 and her debut poetry collection, City Without Altar, was a finalist for the Noemi Press Book Award for Poetry and will be released in August 2022. Her debut middle grade book Anina del Mar Jumps In (Dial) is a novel in verse about a young girl diagnosed with Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis and is set to release in 2023.

Instrumental Music produced / courtesy of Bayden Records

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