"the People's Paths!" NAIIP News Path! - Writing from Native Communities 'Native Writing Communities'

Writing from Native Communities
'Native Writing Communities'
"Conference February 20-22, 2002
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee"

Annoucment from Beth Bretl, UW-M
the People's Voice ~ Sunday, January 13, 2002

Guest Readers and Presenters: Sherman Alexie, Simon Ortiz, Kateri Damm, Gordon Henry, Heid Erdrich, Victor Masayesva, LaVonne Ruoff, Lee Francis, Kimberly Blaeser, Michael Wilson, David Beaulieu
American Indian Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee invites you to participate in a conference that will focus from different angles on the survival of Native American communities in an increasingly transcultural world, and on the roles Native literatures play in assuring the continuation of Indian Nations in the 21st Century.
As a regional Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers event, the conference will look at contemporary literary works from various Indian nations through the presence of representatives from those Native communities and will examine how these writings contribute to the survival of Native history, values, and lifeways.
Conference organizers are planning a broad range of events to be held in a variety of venues including the Milwaukee Indian Community School and Woodland Pattern Book Center. Bringing together diverse voices of the Milwaukee and Native communities, the conference will begin Wednesday evening with a reading by Sherman Alexie.
Thursday's and Friday's events will include "No Ends to Native Communities," a symposium presented by UW-Milwaukee's Center for 21st Century Studies, featuring talks by Simon Ortiz, Kateri Damm, Gordon Henry and LaVonne Ruoff, workshops on publishing and filmmaking, hands-on writing opportunities, one-on-one mentoring sessions with established writers, readings by featured writers, a talk and film showing by Victor Masayesva, open mike opportunities for participants to read their own work, and a visit to an installation of work by Havasupi artist Edgar Heap of Birds.
The conference will also sponsor a writing contest to encourage the recognition and continuation of Native Writing Communities, and will include the invitation to submit to a special focus issue of UW-Milwaukee's Creative Writing Journal, The Cream City Review.
For registration and updated conference information, visit our web site, URL: http://www.uwm.edu/~bretl, and/or contact Beth Bretl, e-mail: bretl@uwm.edu or Kimberly Blaeser, e-mail: kblaeser@uwm.edu..