On Friday, April 13, the Department of Language and Literature hosted the Second Annual Literary Awards and Arts Performance at the Visual Arts Center.
The event included a literary performance by Silvia Goldman, Logan Lu, and Jorge Hernandez;Â a meet and greet with Chicago authors; a mini book fair and book exchange; an award ceremony for the top student literary contest entries; and drinks and tamales provided by Casa de Pueblo.
The night kicked off at 5:30 PM with opening remarks made by Art and Design’s Associate Professor and Department Chair, Nathan Peck, and Spanish Assistant Professor and Director of the Foreign Languages Program, Maria Barros.
At 6 PM, the awards were presented to the winners of the literary contest. Out of twenty-four contestants, three were awarded.
Ricardo Rangel from Saint Xavier came in third place with his essay, Fe prohibida: guerra contra el culto.
Stephanie Marin from Northwestern University came in second place with her essay, Entre el quechua y el castellano en Poemario el Provinciano: PoesÃa Lenguaje del Alma.
Eric Melecio from Northeastern Illinois University was the first-place winner with his narrative, El manga, which he read to the audience after the award ceremony.
After the ceremony, Logan Lu, Silvia Goldman, and Jorge Hernandez performed their poetry to the audience. Logan was first and performed four of his poems; two in Spanish and two in English. Silvia was next and performed several of her poems, and Hernandez finished off the performances with a couple of his works.
The Xavierite also had the opportunity to interview event organizers, Maria Barros and Olga Vilella.
“We felt that there was a need to gather together our own creative artists and community artists,†Vilella stated.
“I think it’s unique in the sense that we are a very small university,†Barros stated when asked what makes this event unique.
“But, we have seen our Hispanic and Latino population growing and growing each year here and we want to acknowledge that fact. We want to represent them and to give them a voice, and to give them an opportunity to show their skills and to engage in culture,†Barros added.
Barros hopes this event will continue to grow and evolve in the future.
“I hope we can continue celebrating each spring and have more and more students participate,†Barros stated.
“This is where we feel that the safety of a place like this is where [students] can try out [their] ideas, [their] voices, [their] art work, and feel that [they] have others who are on a similar path as [they are],†Vilella added.
Vilella also had a piece of advice to aspiring artists:
“If you have a vision and you persevere, you will find, not only a path and your voice, you will also find like-minded people.â€
Caesar Torres
Deputy Editor in Chief