Professors Kátia da Costa Bezerra and Cynthia White have been awarded grant funding from AZ Humanities for the Listening to Other Voices project, a celebration of world literature featuring multiple events over two days in February.
Bezerra, Professor and Associate Head of the Department of Spanish and Portuguese and Director of the World Literature Program, and White, Professor of Classics, will receive $4,998 in funding for the event, scheduled for Feb. 17 and 18, 2022.
“The project is twin-themed: to raise public awareness of world literatures in Southern Arizona and to celebrate the distinct role of world literatures in this pivotal post-pandemic moment as we move from enforced isolation back to community,” Bezerra and White said. “The Listening to Other Voices project will demonstrate that shared discourse around world literature can result in the expansive and compassionate world view essential to campus, local, and global communities.”
The B.A. in World Literature offers students the opportunity to explore their interests in ancient and modern regional literatures such as Eastern Europe, West Africa, the Middle East and national literatures including Chinese, English and Latin with more topical studies (genre, period, gender, ethnicity, indigenous critique, cultural studies, postcolonial studies).
The two-day event will involve local and international communities of scholars, students, and the general public in live and virtual sessions. The Listening to Other Voiceswill consist of five events: Public Lecture and Exhibit, Round Table discussion on Translation, a World Literature Workshop, a Young Readers’ Workshop, and Public Readings (a night to celebrate other voices).