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World Book Night is an annual celebration designed to spread a love of reading and books. To be held in the U.S. as well as the U.K. and Ireland on April 23, 2012. It will see tens of thousands of people go out into their communities to spread the joy and love of reading by giving out free World Book Night paperbacks. World Book Night, through social media and traditional publicity, will also promote the value of reading, of printed books, and of bookstores and libraries to everyone year-round. A list of chosen World Book Night paperback titles can also be found HERE. Help spread the word through the World Book Night Facebook page! Also, on the day of the event we encourage everyone to pass along any books from your own personal collections in order to spread the gift of reading even more. Give a book to friend or stranger! Make it a fun day to remember! If you are a teacher or educator, please consider a classroom program geared toward making April 23rd an awareness day for books, reading and literacy. April 23 is also a symbolic day in world literature. Declared as International Day of the Book by UNESCO in 1995, this celebration of books and literature draws it’s inspiration from a Catalan tradition, the Festival of the Rose. Legend has it that Saint George, Patron Saint of Catalonia and international knight-errant, slew a dragon about to devour a beautiful Catalan princess. From the dragon’s blood sprouted a rosebush, from which the hero plucked the prettiest rose for the princess. Hence the traditional Rose Festival celebrated in Barcelona since the Middle Ages to honor chivalry and love. In 1923, this lover’s “festa” became even more poetic when it merged with “el dia del llibre”, or The Day of the Book, to mark the nearly simultaneous deaths of Miguel de Cervantes and William Shakespeare, the two giants of literary history, on April 23, 1616. On this day in Barcelona, bookstalls and street festivities run the length of the picturesque La Rambla, the old city’s main boulevard and, according to the Spanish author Garcia Lorca, “the only street in the world which I wish would never end”. Read more about this tradition at: DRAGON’S BLOOD & BOOKS- A SPRING FESTIVAL |
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Tags: World Book Day, World Book Night Posted in: Bookstores, Education, General, Reading, world lit | No Comments » |
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Listen to a recent WDET interview with Dr. Fred Pearson, the current director of the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies: http://www.wdet.org/news/story/PeaceandConflictInterview/ Please sign a petition to save the peace center here: http://www.signon.org/sign/save-the-center-for-peace?source=c.url&r_by=1272864 Silent March for Peace FRIDAY October 14th, AT NOON meeting at the front entrance of Old Main/WSU campus : https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=227485250644699 “WSU President Gilmour has moved to have the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies closed, with a final vote of the Board of Governors to be decided in December. The Dean of the College of Liberal Arts (where the Center resides), Robert Thomas, has given a directive to have a formal annual commitment of $177,000 as a pre-condition to withdraw its request for closure by a self-defeating deadline of October 21, 2011. We are intent on taking a collective stand on the import of keeping the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies open. We implore this academic administration to engage in fruitful open negotiation as the Center’s supporters bring forth resources and support, funds and fundraisers to meet this financial challenge. We are taking a stand that peace education is vital to the development of our society and it shall continue. At this Great Turning we need to model the importance of citizenship as living responsibly in the world. And we must ask, “What does a university responsibly give to a society?” The university was originally founded on the principle of providing “academic freedom.” My classes have been cross-listed with the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies and they have creating the context for studying and creating art that moves the culture forward, and raises questions that move our society forward. Save the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies and give peace a chance! We are in the midst of a powerful democratic awakening and we need your help as a leading voice for peace. The Center for Peace and Conflict Studies in Detroit The Center for Peace and Conflict Studies began in 1965 and forged peace education during the seismic social changes of the following decades. This program is the oldest of its kind, and it grew during the most challenging decades of social change for peace, women’s rights, civil rights and the LBGT movement. Now we are another crucible for change. This Center for Peace and Conflict Studies teaches the tools for creating a more just society and beloved communities in a state that has been rated third in the number of hate groups in this country, and where hate crimes against LGBT individuals have reported to be increased in 2010 (according to the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs). It was crucial in mediating life threatening conflict with Arab-American owned businesses in the neighboring township Dearborn after 9/11, and continues to be crucial in educating against bullying in the schools and diminishing violence against youth. It is successful in its mission to “develop and implement projects, programs, curricula, research and publications in areas of scholarship related to international and domestic peace, war, social justice, arms control, globalization, multicultural awareness and constructive conflict resolution” and it is being threatened of being closed by its own administration to serve the budget cuts and be the sacrificial lamb to this economic crisis. We acknowledge that these are difficult times and that the administration must make difficult decisions. However we are there are creative solutions for keeping the center open and we are mandating our administration to consider being flexible to those who are stepping up to the plate to create solutions for sustaining the operation of the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies. Howard Thurman cautions those of us who are concerned with cultural transformation to not allow our visions to conform to a pattern we seek to impose but rather to allow them to be modeled and shaped according to the innermost transformation that is going on in our spirits. It took 46 years of social justice struggle to have the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies forge its presence to now. We must keep it in place, keep what is good. We have to take care of the past in order to take care of the future. If we let it cave now, we will march, and rise, and create revolution to again ask, “What kind of education do we need to forge the future?” And it will be, again, a Center for Peace and Conflict Studies. ” – source; face book announcement, created by Aaron Timlin, Marilyn Zimmerwoman, and Sarah Stawski |
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| Posted in: Detroit & Michigan, Education, Peace & Gaia | 3 Comments » |
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| Posted in: Education, Media, Reading | No Comments » |
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Join us at Book Beat on Sunday, March 6th at 2:00 PM for a special talk and book-signing with Detroit area artist, sculptor, educator and author David Barr. This will be a rare chance to meet and discuss art making, writing and the life work of this engaging and creative spirit. The Book Beat is located at 26010 Greenfield in Oak Park. Please call 248-968-1190 for more information.
David has recently published several new books and will be presenting; SIEVE, a new collection of essays about art and artists that include David Barr’s thoughts on teaching art, making art, the role of public art, and his reminiscence of many Detroit area artists including; Jim Pallas, Bob Caskey, Susan Hauptman, Diane Carr and others. David has also included reviews of some of his favorite inspiring artworks along with artist quotations and lessons learned along life’s road. SIEVE is a book that is sure to please anyone interested in the arts, and is a wonderful insight into one of our own highly original thinkers, educators and creators. “The Sieve seemed to signal new life as well as isolate its raw components. Time is a sieve. It filters and blends memories. Like art.” -David Barr from SIEVE David Barr has also published a collection of “literary fragments” titled TIME IS MY WINDOW. it is a collection of four Michigan writer/artists; (Robert Caskey, Veronica Sanitate, Rick Solomon, David Barr) and the Italian author/artist Christiano Mazzani. A DVD is included with the book with a short film by Paul Mangenello, an interpretation of one of the stories “Old Man By the Pond”. At his last reading at Book Beat one year ago, David presented his book Amercordo: (I Remember) American Style , a collection of recollections and observations from the mid-century American Midwest to Tuscany, the mid-west of Italy.
David has recently been completing work on several books that collect his artistic and personal history. His large format art book Crossing Lines was published in 2009. It carries the reader to some of the world’s most intriguing, mysterious and remote locations. Filled with 180 color and black and white illustrations, the book narrates the various projects David Barr has been involved with over the past thirty years. His work on the Four Corners Project, begun in 1976, spanned a full decade with installations in Greenland, Africa, Irian Jaya and Easter Island. Other geo-structurist works include Arctic Arc in Wales, Alaska, and Naukan, Russia, and Sunsweep on the US/Canada border at Campobello Island, New Brunswick, in Northwest Angle, Minnesota, and Point Roberts, Washington. Here, in his home state, David’s works can be seen at such locations as Chrysler World Headquarters (Revolution), Flint’s Bishop Airport, (Soaring), Detroit Zoo (Source), State of Michigan Historical Museum (Polaris Ring) and Meadowbrook Festival Grounds (Sunset Cube). In 1988 David Barr was awarded the Governor’s Michigan Artist Award. In his acceptance speech he told the audience of his desire to create a Michigan Art Park – a place where artists could tell the story of our state in and through the fundamental materials of nature. That dream has become a reality in 1995 with the Michigan Legacy Art Park , located within the boundaries of Crystal Mountain on M-115 between Cadillac and Benzonia near Thompsonville. David Barr is a graduate of Wayne State University and recipient of the WSU Distinguished Alumni Award. He served on the faculty of Macomb Community College and has received awards, including citations from the Arts Foundation of Michigan and Citizens Concerned for the Arts in Michigan. His work can also be seen at the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Flint Institute of Arts, Fort Lauderdale Museum, Portland Art Museum, Tel Aviv Museum and the University of Michigan. |
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| Posted in: Art, Author signings, Detroit & Michigan, Education, News & Events | 2 Comments » |
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New Hours Beginning Nov. 1Beginning November 1st, Book Beat will be open from 10am to 8pm, Monday thru Friday. Weekend hours will remain the same. For in-store events, we will stay open beyond 8pm when necessary. We apologize for any inconvenience. Please call Book Beat at (248) 968-1190 if you have any questions regarding our hours. Author Miriam Powell at Oak Park Library; Thursday, Oct. 21st
“Meticulously researched and based on primary source materials – including tapes and Young Mr. Obama Presentation at the Southfield Library, Sun., Oct. 24th
How the rough-and-tumble reality of Chicago taught a brilliant but callow young African-American politician the lessons that launched him on the road to history. Barack Obama’s inspirational politics and personal mythology have overshadowed his fascinating history. Young Mr. Obama gives us the missing chapter, a portrait of the politician as a young leader, often too ambitious for his own good, but still equipped with a rare ability to inspire change. His route to the White House began on the streets of Chicago’s South Side. October Reading Group SelectionThe Book Beat Reading Group will meet at 7pm, Wednesday, October 27th, at Goldfish Teahouse, 117 w. Fourth St. in downtown Royal Oak to discuss JG Ballard’s novel Crash. Meetings are free and open to the public, reading selections are discounted 15% at Book Beat. “A work of very powerful originality. Ballard is among our finest writers of fiction.”—Anthony Burgess In this hallucinatory novel, the car provides the hellish tableau in which Vaughan, a “TV Scientist” turned “nightmare angel of the highways,” experiments with erotic atrocities among auto crash victims, each more sinister than the last. Sue Stauffacher Oct. 29 at the Birmingham Unitarian Church Annex
Sue Stauffacher lives with her husband and sons in a 150-plus-year-old farmhouse in the city of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Though Sue is not a rehabilitator herself, she is passionate about helping kids know what to do when the wild meets the child. Stauffacher was born in Pontiac, raised in the Detroit Metro Area and graduated from Lasher High School in Bloomfield Hills. A longtime advocate for literacy, Sue speaks around the country, connecting kids with books to help grow lifelong readers. She is a former book reviewer, and her novels for young readers include Harry Sue, Donutheart, and Donuthead. Please call the Book Beat at (248) 968-1190 if there are any questions regarding this event. InsideOut Literary Arts Fundraiser/Gala Honoring Naomi Long Madgett, Thurs. Oct. 28The InsideOut Literary Arts Project is hosting a fundraiser/gala, “Star By Star” honoring Naomi Long Madgett on October 28th at the Gem Theater from 6- 8:30 pm. Madgett is one of Detroit’s most beloved and recognized poets and was listed in Essence magazine as one of the “Top 40 Favorites” Poets; as were both special guests for the evening, Marilyn Nelson and Toi Derricotte. Nelson will be performing her poetry to a jazz accompaniment and is the author of a Newbery Honor and a Coretta Scott King Honor Award for, “Carver a Life in Poems.” Book Beat will be selling books for Nelson at the event. Tickets are available for purchase at InsideOut Detroit. American Bikers; Photography Exhibit thru Nov. 7th
Thomas A. Crumm at Baldwin Library, Mon., Nov. 8
Thomas Crumm is a third-generation autoworker born and raised in Flint, Michigan, who led GM Chairman John Smale’s Scenario Planning Staff in the mid-1990’s before becoming Roger Smith’s development guru. Crumm exposes the strategic decisions that have caused the foundations of America’s industrial sector to crumble, then lays out a plan for its restoration. Books will be available for purchase and signing at the event. If you have any questions regarding the event, please contact the Book Beat at (248) 968-1190. |
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| Posted in: Author signings, Author/artist interviews and lectures, Book Signings, Children's Books, Detroit & Michigan, Education, News & Events | Comments Off |
Author Miriam Pawel will be speaking at the Oak Park Public Library, (14200 Oak Park Blvd, Oak Park, MI) on Thursday, October 21 about her book THE UNION OF THEIR DREAMS: Power, Hope, and Struggle in Cesar Chàvez’s Farm Worker Movement. The event co-sponsored by the Book Beat will begin at 7:00 p.m. and corresponds with the paperback release of this new appraisal of Ceasar Chavez and the United Farm Workers Movement. Books will be available for purchase at the event.
documents never previously reviewed or revealed – THE UNION OF THEIR DREAMS presents a fresh interpretation and evaluation of Chàvez’s legacy.” from the publisher. MIRIAM PAWEL is an award-winning reporter and editor who spent twenty-five years working for Newsday and the Los Angeles Times. She was recently an Alicia Patterson Foundation Fellow and a John Jacobs Fellow at the Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies. For information please call Book Beat; 248-968-1190.
Edward “Ted” McClelland will be at the Southfield Public Library on Sunday, October 24 at 2:00 p.m. to speak about his new book, Young Mr. Obama: Chicago and the Making of a Black President. This event is co-sponsored by the Book Beat bookstore. Books will be available for purchase at the event. Please call 248-968-1190 for more information. The Southfield Library is located at 26300 Evergreen in Southfield, MI 
Thursday, September 16th at 7 PM a special exhibition of the “Flash Collection” photography by Jim “Flash” Miteff will be presented by his daughter Beverly V. Roberts at the Book Beat Gallery at 26010 Greenfield in Oak Park. This photographic exhibition and signing for her newest book; 
Thomas A. Crumm will be at the Baldwin Public Library (300 W. Merrill St., Birmingham, 48009) on Monday, November 8 at 7pm to sign and discuss his book, “What is Good for General Motors?- Solving America’s Industrial Conundrum.”
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Mem Fox will be speaking Saturday, October 9th at 4:00 pm to 5:30 at the Farmington Community Library, (32737 West 12 Mile Road.) Books will be available for purchase and signing at the event and in advance at Book Beat. This event is meant for parents and educators. “Children can learn to read easily without being taught, by being read to, by playing games with words, and by falling head over heels in love with books.” – Mem Fox Book Beat and the Farmington Community Library are excited to announce a visit by best-selling children’s author Mem Fox. Fox is the author of many beloved children’s books including: Possum Magic, Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge, Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes and Hattie and the Fox. She is also well-known as one of the world’s leading advocates for children’s literacy and the author of Reading Magic; considered by educators as one of the best books explaining the importance of reading to children on a regular basis and a guide for creating readers. This is a rare free appearance by this well-regarded speaker, educator and author and the first visit by her to the general public in the Detroit-Metro Area. Fox, an Australian, is that country’s number one picture-book author and an Associate Prof. in Literacy Studies at Flinders University in Adelaide until her retirement in 1996. Her newest book is Let’s Count Goats, a delightful picture book written for children two-to-six. She will be talking about the importance of parent’s reading aloud to their children. Fox is an excellent speaker and this is a must-attend event for teachers and parents and anyone concerned about future generations and the quality of education in this country and around the world. “If parents understood the huge educational benefits and intense happiness brought about by reading aloud to their children, and if every parent-and every adult caring for a child-read aloud a minimum of three stories a day to the children in their lives, we could probably wipe out illiteracy within one generation.” – quote from Fox’s book Reading Magic Please know that this free event sponsored by Book Beat is possible only from the support of customers who purchase copies of her books at the event or in advance at Book Beat. We believe that visits from world-renowned authors enrich our community. We thank you for your continued support in making these opportunities possible. |
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| Posted in: Author signings, Book Signings, Children's Books, Education | 2 Comments » |
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