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Letter from REFORMA

Posted by Loida García-Febo on January 31, 2009

Dear Ms. Fialkoff and Mr. Shank,

It is with deep regret that Reforma received the news about the closing of Críticas. For the last eight years, the publication has been an extremely valuable tool in the promotion of Latino literature and Spanish language reading materials in the United States.

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Thanks for eight wonderful years

Posted by Bruce Jensen on January 28, 2009

In early 2001 some of us were thrilled to hear of the launch of a major new magazine devoted to books in Spanish. The charming chica in the blog next door, Adriana, put out a call for reviewers. In short order she sent to the shack a shrink-wrapped copy of La caverna, the new novel by recent Nobel laureate José Saramago. The deal was that I could read it, which was a joy, and then return it along with my review, whereupon the book comes back and I get to keep it. A year later I got to see Saramago in the flesh.

I was instantly hooked on Críticas. So were many other readers and contributors who loved the work t...Read More

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Industries: Inside Publishing, Latest Reviews, News, Opinion, Serving Spanish Speakers

Margarita Ingle: First Latina to win a Newbery Honor Award

Posted by Loida García-Febo on January 27, 2009

Margarita Ingle, author of The Surrender Tree: Poems of Cuba’s Struggle for Freedom received one of four Newbery Honor Awards given by the American Library Association (ALA) at its Midwinter Conference in Denver, CO. She is the first Latina to receive such an honor. Ms. Ingle also received the 2009 Pura Belpre Author Award.

As per ALA’s news release:

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Wisconsin asks, "Is Spanish the new German?"

Posted by Bruce Jensen on January 25, 2009

An article about some brilliant-sounding library discussions up in Fond du Lac, "Hispanic program travels immigration road" in The Reporter, reminds me that it's been a whole year already since we visited Wisconsin's ¡Hola! program in the dead of winter.

This week's story features Gabriela and Paco Delatorre who spoke at the Fond du Lac library about moving to the foot of Lake Winnebago from Texas five years ago and establishing a successful business ...Read More

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Industries: Serving Spanish Speakers

NEW: Internet literacy program

Posted by Loida García-Febo on January 23, 2009

Generations on Line (GoL) is an internet literacy program developed for people who are being left behind by this communication technology. The program is a self-teaching tutorial that uses large type, plain language, familiar images and on-screen instructions to help a novice internet user quickly master the basic elements of the internet.

For libraries, it can serve two purposes. It can be used in a class by an instructor to teach basic internet proficiency, or it can be used independently by library patrons to learn and use the internet. It is a valuable adjunct to libraries, especia...Read More

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Industries: Serving Spanish Speakers

NIH Medline Plus SALUD magazine

Posted by Loida García-Febo on January 22, 2009

Medline Plus has launched a new magazine in Spanish. Well, it is a bilingual publication with articles coming in English on one side of the page, and in Spanish on the other side. Fabulous!

The topics on the quarterly publication mirror those on the Medline Plus English-only magazine. Readers will be able to find information about cancer, diabetes, and global health in Spanish! I see this magazine as a tremendous help to provide up-to-date information to customers at Health Resource Centers and Health Libraries in...Read More

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Industries: Serving Spanish Speakers

Children in No Man's Land a gut-wrenching look at the border

Posted by Bruce Jensen on January 21, 2009

Panama-born filmmaker Anayansi Prado focuses on immigrants to the US. Maybe you've seen her Maid In America on public television and strongly recommended in the pages of Críticas.

Her new documentary from Impacto Films is about the littlest victims of the far-from-imaginary line that is the US-Mexico border. Children in No Man's Land/Niños en tierra de nadie opens with scenes from Nogales, the twin cities that straddle the Arizona-Sonora bord...Read More

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Industries: Latest Reviews, New to the Market - Adult, Video

Latin American magazine in Spanish: Primera Revista Latinoamericana de Libros

Posted by Loida García-Febo on January 19, 2009

I recently had the pleasure of reading an issue of the Primera Revista Latinoamericana de Libros (PRL) and was pleasantly surprise with the quality of the articles (I was not aware of this type of magazine!). Every issue covers a wide variety of topics such as current affairs, literature, history, and biographies. Regular contributors include renowned scholars like the brilliant Ilan Stavans from Amherst College.

I read the October/November 2008 issue featuring articles and reviews of books about the slave trade, religion and Mexico, and the story of Latinos in Hollywood. I can say that reading articles in my...Read More

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Targeted Philadelphia branches serve librarian-less schools

Posted by Bruce Jensen on January 19, 2009

With all eyes on Washington DC this week, library woes a couple hours to the northeast in Philadelphia have not gone away. You'll recall that a $1 billion deficit led the mayor to announce the January 1 closure of eleven branches chosen in consultation with the library system's recently installed director. Public outcry ensued; a judge ruled that the mayor would need to, um, check with somebody before doing all that.

There may be no activists quite like public library activists, so last week saw a colorful public protest ("Great street theater," one local reporter raved) over director Siobhan Reardon's coping...Read More

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Industries: Opinion

Principles & Practices for Effective Multicultural Communication

Posted by Bruce Jensen on January 14, 2009

A new, engagingly written report, published just last week, is fun to read and well worth your time. It's all about collaboration across cultures. Subtitled Principles & Practices for Effective Multicultural Communication—Library Edition, its thirty-some pages are right here.

No dry theoretical document, this. Each of its eight principles is illustrated with two real-life examples: one from the library world and one from the rest of the world. The authors even manage to mention PCUN, the groundbreaking agricultural workers' un...Read More

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Industries: Serving Spanish Speakers

REFORMA @ 2009 ALA Midwinter in Denver

Posted by Loida García-Febo on January 13, 2009

Here is the schedule for REFORMA events @ the 2009 ALA Midwinter Conference in Denver:

REFORMA Executive Committee I Friday,January 23, 6:00-8:30pm

REFORMA All Committees I Saturday, January 24, 8:00-10:00 am

REFORMA All Committees II Saturday, January 24, 10:30 am -12:00 pm

REFORMA Party Saturday, January 24at 8:00 p.m.
El Centro Su Teatro
4725 High Street
Denver, CO 80216

www.suteatro.org

REFORMA Board Meeting Sunday,

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Forget your resolutions, already

Posted by Bruce Jensen on January 8, 2009

If you have ever studied a language that's even remotely related to English, you know that false cognates or "false friends"—words that seemingly descended from a common root but whose meanings somehow diverged in the two tongues—are a perennial source of wonder. Learners of Spanish quickly discover that being embarazada, for example, means you're eating for two, which of course is nothing to be embarrassed about.

False cognates are used for fun and profit. Sad to say, con artists in the US prey on some Spanish speakers' confusion about what a notary can and cannot do. The American Bar Association even prepared a document about that scam, "The Dangers of 'N...Read More

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