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Archive: 2004-2005

Fall 2004

Gaze at the Moon, Stars and Southern Art
Thursday, October 28, 2004, 5:30-8:30 PM
The Ogden Museum of Southern Art

The Latin American Resource Center is partnering with the Ogden Museum of Southern to offer teachers the chance to explore the world of the stars and southern art at Ogden After Hours. Teachers will be treated to an evening music, food and fun, while touring the Ogden gathering sample lesson plans, making a Dia de los muertos altar and more. Activities will include Gallery Activity Sheets and Lesson Plans Relating to Science and Art, featuring lesson plans for Keith Sonnier’s Sculptures That Glow: Making Art Out of Neon Light and “Revisiting the World’s Fair: Art and Science of Yesteryear,” learning to make a Dia de los muertos altar featuring calaveras, papel picado, small figurines for the altar, lesson plans and recipies, and a video about Dia de los Muertos in Oaxaca. Teachers will also get to hear a talk entitled Ahau ti Diose: Maya Interpretations of Christianity which will explore religion in Yucatan from the pre-colonial to the modern day and how Christian concepts make sense to the Maya. Presented by Amy George Hirons, Ph.D. Teachers will also have the opportunity to use telescopes to gave at the stars and moon from the terrace of the Ogden.

Ogden Teacher Members Pre-Registration is free. Non-Ogden Members Pre-Registration $5.00 at the door. Music, Food, Drinks, and Friends! Join in the Celebration! To register online or look for more details, please visit http://www.ogdenmuseum.org or email Debbie Randolph at . View photos from this event at the Stone Center’s Flickr site.

Third Annual Maya Symposium and Workshop: Fifteen Centuries of Maya Literature from the Northern Lowlands
Tulane University
October 29 – October 31, 2004

The Yucatán Peninsula is unique in the Maya world in having a continuous literary tradition dating from the prehispanic to the contemporary period. We invite you to join us for an exploration of hieroglyphic, Colonial, and contemporary texts written by the Yucatán Maya. This year’s program features a series of lectures, discussions, and workshops led by specialists in the fields of epigraphy, linguistics, anthropology, and Colonial history. For more information, please contact Brian Knighten.

The teacher workshop on Friday afternoon will feature a talk on the northern Maya lowlands, and MARI’s role in studying this area, by David R. Hixon and David S. Anderson, of Tulane University. Their presentation is entitled A Photographic Tour of the Northern Maya Lowlands through the Lens of the Middle American Research Institute. Teachers are encouraged to attend Friday’s keynote lecture “The Sky in Mayan Literature” by Anthony Haven. The talk provides an overview of what we have learned about Maya astronomy and its relationship to social and religious practices from a study of the hieroglyphic Maya codices over the past three decades. On Sunday, all teachers will participate in the afternoon workshop What’s Your Sign?: Maya Interpretations of the Zodiac. This hands-on workshop will explore the book of Chilam Balam Kaua allowing teachers to read their birthdate chart from this Maya book. Lunch will be provided on this day. Attendance at the Sunday morning glyph workshops and the Saturday symposium talks is optional.

Workshop at the Louisiana Council for the Social Studies
November 12-13, 2004
Lafayette, Louisiana

LARC will offer a three-hour workshop at the 38th Annual Louisiana Council for the Social Studies on November 12, 2004. This workshop will introduce teachers to the many resources available through National Resources Centers, as well as on the web. This session will also: discuss implications of Free Trade; provide examples of how to use case studies to enrich concepts such as globalization, human rights, and environmental justice; make with a strong connection between content standards and diversified content; and offer “best strategies"  to introduce Latin America content into the curriculum. Visit the LCSS website for more information.

Including Latin America in the K12 Curriculum
Pre-NCSS workshop
November 18, 2004
Baltimore, Maryland

LARC and the Teresa Lonazo Long Institute for Latin American Studies at the University of Texas at Austin are co-sponsoring a day long pre-conference clinic at NCSS. The clinic is entitled “Including Latin America in the K-12 Curriculum” and will take place on Thursday, November 18, 2014, prior to the start of the NCSS Conference. The 84th Annual NCSS conference themed “Democracy and Diversity: Social Studies in Action,” takes place the following three days, November 19-21, 2004. This Annual Conference will include hundreds of exhibit booths, 300 professional development sessions, dozens of clinics and tours, and two Pulitzer Prize Winners. The intent of this three-day event is to explore the meaning of democratic foundations and the diversity that has always characterized the global community. For more information visit NCSS.

Spring 2005

Learning from Everyday People: Teaching Your Students to do Cultural Research with the Garfuna of Central America and New Orleans
Thursday, March 10, 2005
4:00 – 8:00 PM
Greenleaf Conference Room, 100A Jones Hall, Tulane University

The Garifuna culture was born in 1635 when Africans headed for slavery in the New World escaped from a Spanish shipwreck and began to mix with the Carib-Arawak inhabitants of the island of Saint Vincent. After a series of conflicts with the British they were exiled and landed on the shores of present day Honduras in 1797. The Garifuna language is primarily of Carib and Arawak origin, and they have distinct cultural practices. Today the Garifuna primarily live along the Caribbean coast of Central America, with the majority (an estimated 200,000) living in Honduras. It is believed that the fourth largest stateside contingent of this Afro Carib group reside in New Orleans. The goal of this symposium on the Gari­funa is twofold, sponsored by Xavier University and the Stone Center for Latin American Studies, one objective is to provide information on a fascinating culture which has a strong presence in our local community, as well as a unique place in the world at large. The second intent is to offer some insight into the study of groups of human beings, including some basic resources and curricula for teachers. Though the Garifuna are the focus and case study for this symposium, the insights and resources presented will be useful for a variety of investigations individuals or teachers and students may want to undertake. Participants will receive a list of basic resources related to the Gari­funa and ethnographic research, as well as a curriculum for ethnographic work which tough best suited to secondary students, can be modified for elementary students also.

Topics and Presenters:

  • “The Gari­funa of Honduras”: Marco Bicchieri, doctoral candidate in Latin American Studies (History and Anthropology), Tulane University, Peace Corps volunteer and teacher in Honduras, high school teacher for seventeen years
  • “Learning from Everyday People: My Experience Working With Garifuna People and Bringing Ethnographic Research into the Classroom”: Donna Bonner, Ph.D., Assistant Director of African Diaspora Studies and Visiting Assistant Professor of African and African Diaspora Studies, Tulane University, Anthropologist with 10 years experience working with and learning from the Garifuna people of Belize
  • "Cultural Pride: The Experience of First and Second Generation Garinagu in New Orleans:" Carmen Villegas Rogers, Associate Professor of Spanish and French, Xavier University, researcher in a project at Xavier, "The Garifuna of New Orleans: A Vibrant Culture Speaks," that has been interviewing local Gari­funa and presenting research results for the last two years
  • “Personal Accounts: A panel of Garifuna community members from New Orleans will tell their stories and answer questions from participants.

View photos from this event at the Stone Center Flickr Site

Cuba Connections
March – April 2005
Ashé Cultural Arts Center, 1712 Oretha Castle Haley, New Orleans, LA

Cuba Connections is a series of public lectures, teacher workshops and concerts about Cuban music and its connections to New Orleans. Cuba and New Orleans are two undeniable focal points in the history of Latin Jazz. Five Cuban music experts will speak about different aspects of Cuban music and how it relates to New Orleans. Every event will end with a 30-minute teacher session on integration strategies and lesson plan development. A handout of benchmarks and GLEs covered during each session will be made available. This event is co-presented with CubaNOLA. For a further description of the lectures, please visit the LARC website.

The schedule and speakers are as follows:

Wednesday, March 16 6:00 – 8:30 PM

  • Bill Summers – “Afro-Cuban Yoruba Sacred Music and Dance”: Grammy award nominated percussionist of Los Hombres Caliente. Mr. Summers is a New Orleans resident and has traveled extensively to Cuba over the last 30 years to study Afro-Cuban drumming. He will talk about Afro-Cuban sacred music and dance.
  • Ned Sublette – “Other Afro-Cuban Religions”: Author of Cuba and It’s Music: From the first drums to the mambo, an in-depth history of Cuban music, and a professional musician. Mr. Sublette was born in Louisiana and he’s currently a Rockefeller Fellow at Tulane. He will present on the European and African roots of Cuban music as well as Cuban influences on American popular music.

Wednesday, March 30 6:00 – 8:30 PM

  • Arturo O’Farrill – “Jazz and Latin jazz”: The director for Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Afro-Cuban Latin Jazz Orchestra, the son of Chico O’Farrill (the father of Afro-Cuban jazz in New York City during the 1950’s and 60’s), and an accomplished jazz musician in his own right. Mr. O’Farrill will be traveling to New Orleans from New York City, and he will look at the complex relationship between jazz and Latin jazz.
  • Tomás Montoya – “Street Parades: Second Lines and Congas”: A resident of Santiago de Cuba, Mr. Montoya will add a distinctly Cuban perspective to the series by looking at Conga street parades in Santiago de Cuba and Second Lines in New Orleans. Mr. Montoya’s participation is a unique opportunity since he is one of only a handful of scholars from Cuba to have received visas to enter the United States in the last year. He is in New Orleans to do comparative research on Congas and Second Lines.

Wednesday, April 6, 6:00 -8:30 PM

  • Ned Sublette – “African and European Roots of Cuban Music”: Author of Cuba and It’s Music: From the first drums to the mambo, an in-depth history of Cuban music, and a professional musician. Mr. Sublette was born in Louisiana and he’s currently a Rockefeller Fellow at Tulane. He will present on the European and African roots of Cuban music as well as Cuban influences on American popular music.
  • Michael Skinkus – “Transmission of musical traditions in Cuba and in New Orleans”: A local musician and scholar, Mr. Skinkus performs with many popular local ensembles and holds a Master’s degree from Tulane Latin American Studies. He has traveled to Cuba many times to study Cuban percussion and he will present on the transmission of musical traditions in Cuba and in New Orleans.

View photos from this event at the Stone Center Flickr Site

Summer 2005

Summer Institute on Performance in Latin America
June 16-18, 2005
Tulane University

This workshop will use performance and participant-observation as a means of fostering multicultural understanding, appreciation and interpretation in the classroom. Teachers will work with artist and scholars of understudied and underrepresented traditions in order to learn how active engagement with live performance can serve as an entry point to discussions on language, race, and cultural heritage. Our special guest will be the Afroperuvian music and dance troupe Teatro del Milenio whose performance we will use as a case study for modeling these integration strategies. At the same time, presenters will work with teacher practitioners on how to develop partnerships with local musicians and other performing artists so that the performative richness of one’s own community can be brought into the classroom. This workshop will be beneficial to dance, history, language, music and social studies teachers as well as teachers in other disciplines who are interested in incorporating an arts in education component to their curricula.

Co-sponsored by University of Florida, Florida International University, and University of Texas at Austin.

For more information, please visit the Summer Institute Webpage.

Teaching Through Art: Exploring Latino Culture through Art
July 25-29, 2005
Maryhill Museum, Goldendale, Washington

Explore the art and history of Latino culture in this week-long course featuring lectures, study of original artwork in the galleries, and hands-on sessions. Special emphasis will be given to the development of teaching strategies that integrate art into the classroom. Guest speakers and artists will participate throughout the week. The exhibition: People, Places and Perceptions: A Look at Contemporary Northwest Latino Art, will be the focal point for activities and discussions. Credit pending through Graduate School of Education/Continuing Education, Portland State University. For more information visit or call 509-773-3733.