“I have been so busy asking for faith that I forgot to ask for patience.”

~ Marjorie Agosin, I lived on Butterfly Hill

Latino Americans: 500 Years of History continues at IU East On Oct. 12-13, with a visit from award-winning author and activist Marjorie Agosin. Agosin is the winner of the Pura Belpré award for her young adult novel I Lived on Butterfly Hill. The book reflects her experience as a child during the severe political turmoil in Chile. Agosin is the author of numerous books, including these that are available in the IU East Campus Library: Amigas, A Cross and a Star, Landscapes of a New Land, Stitching Resistance, and Women, Gender, and Human Rights. She has been described as “a poet, human rights activist, and literary critic. [She is] interested in Jewish literature and literature of human rights in the Americas; women writers of Latin America; migration, identity, and ethnicity.” Currently, Agosin is a Professor of Latin American Studies and Spanish at Wellesley College in Massachusetts. She earned her Ph.D. in Latin America literature at Indiana University. More information about her academic career is here.

Agosin will present a public lecture, open to the community, on Monday, October 12^th at 4 p.m. in the IU East Campus Library, Hayes Hall. Also in the Campus Library, on Tuesday, October 13^th at 2:30 p.m., Agosin will lead an Arpillera workshop. Arpilleras are textile artwork that were used as a form of political protest during the totalitarian military regime of the 1970s and 1980s in Chile (Source). For more information about Arpilleras, please see our LibGuide. Supplies for creating an arpillera will be provided. Reservations for the workshop are recommended here to ensure there will be sufficient materials. If you have favorite bits of fabric and momentos you are welcome to bring those.

Agosin’s visit is supported by the IU East School of Humanities and Social Science, IU East Mindful Explorations, and the NEH/ALA grant. Latino Americans: 500 Years of History is a public programming initiative produced by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) & the American Library Association, and is part of an NEH initiative, The Common Good: The Humanities in the Public Square.

If you have questions or would like to learn more, we are online for you 24/7! iueref@iue.edu