• Activism
• ASL Interpreted program
• Black Voices
• Headliners
• Healing
• Queer Voices
• Social Justice
• Ticketed

The Embodiment of Care

Prentis Hemphill in conversation with Mia Birdsong, Introduction by Aya de Leon, and Introduction and Welcome by Berkeley Mayor Adena Ishii. Introductory live music performance by Bushwick Book Club Oakland

As we emerge from the past few years of collective upheaval, how do we face the complexities of our time with joy, authenticity, and connection? Therapist, somatics teacher, activist, and writer Prentis Hemphill shows us how in What It Takes to Heal, a life-affirming framework toward a future in which healing is done in community. In Hemphill’s revolutionary framework, we don’t have to carry our emotional burdens alone. Healing our bodies, minds, and souls starts with the principles of embodiment—the recognition of our body’s sensations and habits, and the beliefs that inform them— and developing the interpersonal skills necessary to break down the doors of disconnection. What currently separates us isn’t only the ever-present injustices built around race, class, gender, values, and beliefs, but also our denial of our interdependence and need for belonging, as researcher and writer Mia Birdsong demonstrates in How We Show Up. Through research, interviews, and stories of lived experience, Birdsong reminds us of our inherent connectedness and provides a blueprint for showing up, both literally and figuratively. Join us to hear from experts and leaders in this enriching conversation that will challenge mainstream models of self-reliance and instead infuse healing with the rigor of justice, vulnerability, repair, and accountability. ASL Interpreted Program!

Book signing information: Green Apple Books, at the venue

• Asian American Voices
• ASL Interpreted program
• Black Voices
• Essay
• Fiction
• Headliners
• Queer Voices
• Social Policy
• South Asian Voices
• Ticketed

“Writing as an Other”

Tara Dorabji, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Greg Sarris, moderated by Ajuan Mance. Introductory live music performance by Bushwick Book Club Oakland

“What is the relationship between the role of the outsider and literary writing?” Pulitzer Prize-winning Viet Thanh Nguyen poses this question in his new book To Save and To Destroy, which is based on a series of six lectures at Harvard. Having escaped from the Vietnam War to a refugee camp in Pennsylvania when he was four, Nguyen is no stranger to being an outsider who carries both the burdens and pleasures of being the “minor” writer. In this event, he’ll be joined by two other brilliant literary outsiders: Greg Sarris, Chairman of the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria and celebrated author of fiction and memoir that delve into complexities of belonging and identity as a Native American, and award-winning novelist and filmmaker Tara Dorabji, the daughter of Parsi-Indian and German-Italian migrants, whose Call Her Freedom won the Simon & Schuster BOOKS LIKE US Grand Prize. In an era of constant “othering” within nations entrenched in colonialism and violence, it is natural for victims to feel their pain is unique. The challenge for “other”-American writers, then, is to practice what Nguyen calls “capacious grief” and to connect our sorrows in an act of radical hope. At our Saturday headliner event moderated by artist, writer, and Professor of African American literature Ajuan Mance, whose work explores the intersection of race, gender, and power, these authors will explore how they use storytelling and cultural sovereignty in the face of dominant ideologies, simultaneously embracing and overcoming their identities as “outsiders. ASL Interpreted program!

Book signing information: Green Apple Books, at the venue

Sponsored by the Federated Indians of Graton Rancheria and SACHI

• ASL Interpreted program
• Gender Theory
• Headliners
• Nonfiction
• Philosophy
• Politics
• Queer Voices
• Science Fiction
• Social Justice
• Ticketed
• Trans Voices

Who’s Afraid of Gender?

Judith Butler in conversation with micha cárdenas, moderated by MK Chavez. Introduction and welcome by Brooke Warner. Introductory live music performance by Bushwick Book Club Oakland

During the 2024 presidential race, the Trump campaign released an anti-trans ad blitz across swing states. Once in power, he wasted no time issuing an executive order proclaiming there are only two biological sexes. Accordingly, trans protections, gender affirming care, and DEI initiatives are being dismantled nationwide. Philosopher and human rights activist Judith Butler has long been a lightning rod for society’s fears, myths, and projections about the idea of gender. Now, when we need them most, Butler is back with what critics are calling their most mainstream and urgent book yet, Who’s Afraid of Gender? It’s both an intervention and an example of rising to meet the moment. At our Sunday headliner event, Butler will be in conversation with micha cárdenas, a novelist and scholar known for her work on “transreal” identities and digital media, whose latest sci-fi novel, Atoms Never Touch, tackles themes of neurodivergence and trans identity. Moderated by Afro-Latinx educator and writer MK Chavez, Butler and cárdenas will discuss their complementary yet distinct approaches to gender theory and identity: putting Butler’s foundational concepts in conversation with cárdenas’s cutting-edge explorations of biotechnological realities. ASL Interpreted Program!

Book signing information: Green Apple Books, at the venue

• Activism
• ASL Interpreted program
• Black Voices
• Headliners
• Politics
• Racial Justice
• Social Justice
• Ticketed

Portable Intersectionality: Roxane Gay in conversation with Alicia Garza

Roxane Gay in conversation with Alicia Garza, moderated by Aya de León. Introductory live music performance by Bushwick Book Club Oakland.

As critical works and perspectives are being increasingly censored by the federal government’s hypocritical campaign for its distorted vision of “free speech,” our strategies for organizing and mobilizing communities must adapt to most effectively resist these attacks on justice. Here with an urgent reminder that feminism is expansive rather than definitive is Haitian-American writer and self-proclaimed “bad feminist” Roxane Gay, whose latest collection, The Portable Feminist Reader, depicts the feminist canon as one that represents a long history of feminist scholarship, embraces skepticism, and invites robust discussion and debate. According to the Starred Library Journal, she “provides accessible entry points into feminism and offers even advanced scholars new ways of viewing the complex, intersectional histories of feminist thought, literature, and action” by presenting multicultural perspectives, ecofeminism, feminism and disability, feminist labor, gender perspectives, and Black feminism. Intersectionality and having diverse voices is crucial in the fight for justice, and in conversation with Gay is another powerful voice in media and co-creator of #BlackLivesMatter and the Black Lives Matter Global Network, Alicia Garza, who will be the first to say that “hashtags don’t start movements. People do.” Thus, the first step forward is to equip oneself with knowledge from experts like Gay and Garza, who encourage people to carry their power within, allowing them to adapt and transform, but never conform, in their intersectionality. ASL Interpreted program!

Book signing information: Green Apple Books, at the venue

Sponored by She Writes Press