ALA Public Programs Office announces new speakers for PLA preconference on library programming
Contact: Lainie Castle
Program Officer, Communications
312-280-5055
lcastle@ala.org
For Immediate Release
January 24, 2006
ALA Public Programs Office announces new speakers for PLA preconference on library programming
(CHICAGO) The ALA Public Programs Office (PPO) is pleased to announce three new speakers for its preconference on library programming, which will be held in conjunction with the 2006 PLA National Conference. Titled "Cultural Programming for Libraries: Linking Libraries, Communities and Culture," the preconference will focus on preparing library staff to conduct excellent humanities programs for the public, and will take place Tuesday, March 21, 9 a.m.–5 p.m. and Wednesday, March 22, 9 a.m.–noon in Boston. To register, visit
www.placonference.org.
The preconference agenda will include an interactive poetry presentation with award-winning poet Mark Doty, a panel discussion featuring Doty and Thomas Doherty, chair of the Film Studies Program of Brandeis University, and a lecture and discussion program led by Barbara E. Petzen, Outreach Coordinator for the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University.
Mark Doty's six books of poems and three books of nonfiction prose have been honored by the National Book Critics Circle Award, the PEN/Martha Albrand Prize for nonfiction, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, a Whiting Writers Award, a Lila Wallace/Readers Digest Writers Award, and, in the United Kingdom, the T.S. Eliot Prize. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Ingram Merrill Foundation, and the Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. He is a professor at the University of Houston, and lives in New York City and Provincetown. “School of the Arts: Poems,” his latest collection, was published in 2005.
Thomas Doherty is professor of American Studies and chair of the Film Studies Program at Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Iowa. He serves on the editorial boards of
Cinema Journal and the film magazine
Cineaste . He is the author of several books, including “ Cold War, Cool Medium: Television, McCarthyism, and American Culture” [2003], which was named an outstanding academic title for 2004 by
Choice magazine.
Barbara E. Petzen is Outreach Coordinator and Webmaster for the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. She received a B.A. in International Politics and Middle Eastern Studies from Columbia College, an honors degree in Oriental Studies and Arabic from Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar, and is completing doctoral studies in History and Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University. Petzen has taught courses on Middle Eastern history, Islam and women's studies at Dalhousie University and St. Mary's University in Nova Scotia, Canada.
Other preconference presenters include Stu Wilson, Director of Public Awareness and Communications with the Friends of the St. Paul Public Library; Deb Robertson, Director of the ALA Public Programs Office and author of “ Cultural Programming for Libraries: Linking Libraries, Communities, and Culture”; Susan Brandehoff, Program Director, ALA Public Programs Office; and Mary Davis Fournier, Project Director, ALA Public Programs Office.
Created for library staff in charge of cultural and other programming as well as library administrators and trustees, the preconference will provide the training needed to plan and present programs that are well-attended crowd pleasers. Preconference attendees will learn how to design and present high-quality cultural programming at their library, as well as where and how to apply for cultural program funding and find organizations or groups that want to collaborate on programming. They'll also find out about model and turnkey programs that are available to the beginning and experienced programmer, including reading and discussion programs, traveling exhibitions, and multi-format literary/humanities programming.
Preconference registration fees are $195 for PLA and Massachusetts Library Association (MLA) members, $250 for ALA members and $305 for non-members. This fee includes a copy of the books “ Cultural Programming for Libraries: Linking Libraries, Communities, and Culture” (ALA, 2005), a $35 value.
A portion of the registration fee will support the Cultural Communities Fund, an endowment to support the development of cultural programming in libraries, in response to a Challenge Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (
www.ala.org/ccf).
This preconference workshop is presented with support from the Cultural Communities Fund and a major gift from H. W. Wilson. The Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities Program will provide program support.
To register for "Cultural Programming for Libraries: Linking Libraries, Communities and Culture," visit the PLA 2006 Conference Web site at
www.placonference.org. For more information, contact the Public Programs Office at 312-280-5045 or
publicprograms@ala.org.
