Three Day Workshops

Fall 2004 - Teresa Ortiz
Video of Teresa Ortiz's talk
Monday, October 25, Alumni Lounge SJU, 8:00 pm.

Teresa Ortiz
A Mexican educator, writer, activist and mother. Presently, Teresa is the director of Centro de Derechos Laborales (Immigrant Workers' Rights Center) at the Resource Center of the Americas in Minneapolis, MN. Centro de Derechos Laborales works with the Latino community in the Twin Cities to educate, inform, organize and advocate for labor and human rights of immigrants. From 1995 to 2000, Teresa lived in Chiapas, Mexico, where she founded and directed a nonprofit development and fair trade organization, Cloudforest Initiatives; and wrote a book of testimonials of Maya women, Never Again A world Without Us.

Spring 2004 - Ernesto Cardenal
Reception
Tuesday, April 13, Quad 264, 4:00 pm.- 6:00 pm.

"Faith, Politics, and Poetry: A Poetry Reading by Ernesto Cardenal"
Wednesday, April 14, Stephen B. Humphrey Auditorium, 8:00 pm.

"Reflections on the Nicaraguan Revolution"
Thursday, April 15, Alumnae Hall in the Haehn Campus Center, 7:30 pm. 

Ernesto Cardenal
A Nicaraguan poet, priest, revolutionary, and a former Minister of Culture for the Sandinista government (1979-1988), stood at the center of debates over the intersection of faith and politics in Latin America in the 1970s and 1980s. He studied under Thomas Merton at Our Lady of Gethsemani Abbey, a Trappist monastery in Kentucky, in the 1950s and became an accomplished theologian and vanguard practitioner of liberation theology, founding ecclesial base communities that combined Bible study and political consciousness raising at Solentiname in Nicaragua. An internationally renowned poet, he is the author of numerous volumes, including Zero Hour, Flights of Victory, Homage to the American Indians and Cosmic Canticle. His poetry explores the themes of Latin American identity, social justice, and revolution, linking the transformation of society with the transformation of the heart. 

Latino/Latin American Residencies 
To introduce Latino and Latin American issues to a substantial number of people, the Learning Community invites prominent Latino and Latin American specialists to campus for three day residencies once each semester.  The Learning Community devotes one residency to Latino issues and the other to Latin American concerns.  Moreover, each year the Learning Community selects one nationally renowned and one regionally known specialist for the residencies.

In the months before the residency, members of the Learning Community share information about the guest and also read and discuss relevant materials published by or about the specialist.  The residency consists of a workshop devoted to the area of expertise of the specialist, visits to appropriate classrooms, and informal gatherings with students.  Each residency concludes with a major public address.