Speaking in Tongues
Aleksandr Chernousov writes about the experience of hearing his first language turned to violent authoritarian ends and finding it anew in Oregon
Unwritten
Jessica Yen on the anxieties and frustrations of parenting in multiple languages.
Reclaiming Our Language
How Klamath people are working to revitalize their language. By Ke-ash Ne-Asht Sheshatko
Safety Search
Judy Jiang writes about looking for solace in words after the death of a family member.
Vanishing Words
Grazia Rutherford-Swan writes about a stroke, an abusive relationship, and learning to speak again.
Unapologetically Afghan American
Yalda Asmatey writes about straddling two worlds: Afghanistan, the country of her birth, and the United States.
The Not-So-Simple Past
Joe Vance shares memories from the ESL classroom, where giving language to stories involves more than just questions of grammar.
Climate
Editor Ben Waterhouse writes about choosing the theme "Climate" amid a summer of heat waves and fires.
So Much Together: Shared Possessions
Patricia Vázquez Gómez is an artist whose practice investigates the social functions of art, the intersections between aesthetics, ethics, and politics, and the expansion of community-based art practices. She strongly believes that we all possess unique talents, knowledge, and perspectives that make us unique and unordinary, and that those special possessions are often obscured by the situations in which we find ourselves. In this workshop, Patricia will share some of her projects and guide conversations and quick activities to connect to the themes and methods of her artwork. We will learn about the unique cultural possessions that each participant brings in the form of sayings inherited from families and cultures and make a set of posters featuring those sayings.
So Much Together: Shared Possessions
Patricia Vázquez Gómez is an artist whose practice investigates the social functions of art, the intersections between aesthetics, ethics, and politics, and the expansion of community-based art practices. She strongly believes that we all possess unique talents, knowledge, and perspectives that make us unique and unordinary, and that those special possessions are often obscured by the situations in which we find ourselves. In this two-part workshop, Patricia will share some of her projects and guide conversations and quick activities to connect to the themes and methods of her artwork. We will learn about the unique cultural possessions that each participant brings in the form of sayings inherited from families and cultures and make a set of posters featuring those sayings.
Posts
Readers write about Possession.
Tutoring the Kingpin
May Maylisa Cat writes about how helping a friend apply for the citizenship exam revived memories of her own experiences of educational discrimination and marginalization.
Oregon Shorts
The Northwest Film Festival's program of Oregon short films includes Sika Stanton and Donnell Alexander's "An Oregon Canyon," produced as part of Oregon Humanities' This Land project.
My Name
Sravya Tadepalli writes about her experiences with people mispronouncing her name.
From the Director: Word Problems
Executive Director Adam Davis on the provocations of language and the search for the right words in a flawed world
A Lot to Ask of a Name
Natchee Blu Barnd on how Native American names are used as symbols in white spaces
Day of Judgment
Simon Tam writes about the day he won a case before the supreme court and realized that winning can be complicated.
What Work Does a Street Sign Do?
A conversation with geographer Natchee Blu Barnd on how place-naming shapes perspectives of history related to Indigenous peoples in the US.
On Tinnitus
Lucie Bonvalet writes about eight years of living with tinnitus, "a gray veil, a sort of curtain of rain, between me and everything outside of me."
The Third Bullet
Jason Arias on reckoning with abbreviated phrases and abbreviated lives as an EMT.
Slow Ascent
A Chinese American woman searches for belonging in the country of her grandparents. An essay by Jessica Yen
Trademark Offense
Bandleader Simon Tam explains his fight to trademark his band’s name, “The Slants.” Tam recently argued his case before the US Supreme Court. He won.
Mark My Words
Linguist Edwin Battistella on pronouns and the myth of a "me generation"
Unimaginable Riches
The unfamiliar offers its own rewards. An essay by Joanne Mulcahey