Literary Hub
Welcome to El Taller's Literary Hub, where writers, educators, and community members are coming together to bring to you writing workshops and other unique literary events. We are committed to building a strong culture of literacy and writing in our community. Writing is a powerful tool. We want to inspire people to be comfortable in her own skin, comfortable with our own words, and comfortable sharing stories and forming groups where we can hear each other see each other especially right now, during such a hard time. We are creating a space to see humanity in each other and make room for people to believe in their own stories and words. All funds generated from these will go back to supporting literacy programs and our local writers and artists.
*All Literary Hub sales are final. No refunds on virtual workshops or events.
*Accessibility needs: Currently we are able to offer ASL interpretation, please indicate if you will need that for this workshop
February (Virtual) Events
Spaces are limited, reserve a spot now
Writing Café w/ El Taller’s Book Curators: Saturday, February 6th, 10-12 | FREE
Join Mary Guerrero and Y-Binh Nguyen (our book curators) in this Saturday morning Writing Café. We will generate some new writing together and explore some craft topics and themes that will help us enhance our writing.
Spaces are limited, reserve a spot now
WRITING WORKSHOP: Saturday, February 13th, 12-2pm w/ Gladys Wangeci Gitau-Damaskos | $20
A Manifesto of Hope: Having survived so much political and psychological turmoil in 2020, many of us have considered what we would have to do to survive if the US fell. Oftentimes, it's harder to start that process of research because it's easier to pretend there is no chaos around us than it is to start preparing. Luckily, a few of us looked into the first steps that I can share with you so you feel empowered to move through the process. The course will also validate your fears of what has occurred in the past few years and give you other tools that you can call on later on if necessary. We will use “Parable of the Sower” by Octavia Butler as a mentor text.
Gladys Wangeci Gitau-Damaskos (she/they)! Gladys is a Kenyan-born writer, artist, designer, teacher and activist from Lawrence, MA. She is the author of the book “there's the truth then there's other things” and is currently working on her second collection which will feature poems and doodles that came to life while quarantining during this weird year. When Gladys (or Mx. Gitau) is not teaching Humanities to her high schoolers, or doodling she can be found on her couch next to her husband, William, and her tortoises, Sakis and Recho, tweeting memes into the void.
Writing Café w/ El Taller’s Book Curators: Saturday, February 20, 10-12pm | FREE
Join Mary Guerrero and Y-Binh Nguyen (our book curators) in this Saturday morning Writing Café. We will generate some new writing together and explore some craft topics and themes that will help us enhance our writing.
WORKSHOP: Sunday, February 21, 10-12pm, Heal and Mend: A hands on art and writing workshop with Christine Jee at the Addison Gallery of American Art | $20
“Mend with wisdom/mend with love./It will mend the earth/at the same time.” - Yoko Ono
Take a virtual museum visit and learn more about two of the Addison Gallery’s timely exhibitions: Aphrodite Désirée Navab: Landmines of Memory and Yoko Ono: Mend Piece. Participants will then be invited to use writing and art making as metaphors for healing and mending.
Art materials will be provided and available for pickup at El Taller in February. Participants who will be supplying their own materials should plan on gathering white paper, scissors, tape, and string.
Anyone who is interested in visiting the Addison can reserve their free timed tickets at addisongallery.org.
Christine Jee is the Manager of School and Community Collaborations at the Addison Gallery of American Art at Phillips Academy, Andover. In this role, she works closely with elementary through college-level educators and local community organizations in designing and facilitating personalized museum visits to connect their classroom learning with the Addison Gallery’s exhibitions and collection.
Christine holds a B.S. in Elementary Education from Boston University, an M.Ed. in Arts in Education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and was named “2019 Museum Art Educator of the Year” by the Massachusetts Arts Educator Association. Prior to working at the Addison, she was an elementary teacher at the Frost School in Lawrence, where she made it a priority to create meaningful, interdisciplinary, community-based arts experiences for her students in her own classroom.
WRITING WORKSHOP: Saturday, February 27 12-2pm w/ Milly Joseph | $20
Am I Lazy or Unclear?: Do you have a list of ideas and projects that you were so passionate about doing that somehow just fizzled out and you can't quite figure out why? Maybe you have something that you really want to go after but somehow can't seem to take the first step to making it happen? In" Am I Lazy or Unclear", we will be going in depth of Step 1 of my Create on Demand process which is "Do the Pre-work." Doing the Prework requires gaining mental clarity about what it is you want and what it takes to have it. This powerful step sets up the foundation to ensure you are doing what your heart truly desires and are capable of time at your will. Mastering this lays the foundation to generate results for your ideas to go beyond the pages you write on. In this workshop, you will understand whether you are "lazy" or should just be focusing your attention elsewhere. We will go over habits studies and exercises to have the tools to get started on the things you truly want.
Milly Joseph (she/her/hers) is a Haitian born creative with a flair for infusing analytics into any artistic creation. Growing up, she taught herself multiple mediums of art such as knitting, video editing, design, writing, and more through a passion of learning different ways of expression.
While she pursues many creative expressions, Milly’s background is in supply chain. She is currently working as a materials planner for a juice company. Along with that she has worked in project and inventory management and training coordination. She lives by the motto that the power of the brain helps us solve many things in life through simple calculations. Milly lives by the quote “Genius is just preparation in disguise.” This analytical thinking is the unique spin she puts into her art, combining artistic creation with math and science, to create pieces that are beautiful yet calculated.
On off days, she’s exploring new restaurants, spending time with her loved ones, and listening to audiobooks.
Spaces are limited, reserve a spot now
WRITING WORKSHOP: Sunday, February 28, 12-2pm w/ Ceci Lewis | $20
Ripples of our Lives: A Tagmemic Approach to Self-Discovery: For this workshop, we will be the tagmeme in the structure of the story that becomes our life story. We are not alone in this story, and as such, we must include the elements that make up our lives. We will spend our time together developing the characters and place of our story and sharing them.
Cecelia “Ceci” Durazo Lewis was born and raised in Douglas, Arizona. For the past 26 years, she has taught writing at various levels in the Arizona public education system K-16. In 2016, she earned her Ph.D. in Mexican American Studies from the University of Arizona. Her dissertation work centered on the lives and stories of women of Mexican heritage who lived in Douglas during the first half of the 20th century. Ceci recently retired from English at Cochise Community College. She continues to work with diverse teacher networks that include the Bread Loaf Teacher Network, Andover/Bread Loaf, the Navajo Nation, and the Santa Fe Indian School. Her passion is helping writers find their voices and share their experiences in writing.
Spaces are limited, reserve a spot now
WRITING WORKSHOP: Wednesday, March 10th and Wednesday, March 24th 7-9 pm w/ Jessica Filion | $40
Using Poetic Forms in Service of Your Writing: Are sonnets and haiku the only poetry forms you are familiar with? Have you ever been curious about using form in your poetry but have been intimidated by them? Are you a lover of poetry and writing and would like the opportunity to engage with writing poetry in a supportive community space? If so then this workshop is for you! This workshop is a two-part series. In the first session is a generative workshop where we will look at some examples of poetic forms and attempt to write some of our own. The second workshop is designed to help you edit what you wrote from the previous workshop with input from your peers as well as the workshop facilitator.
Jessica Filion (she/her) is a healer, poet, editor, and educator from the Merrimack Valley. Dominicana by way of her parents who both hail from Santiago, Dominican Republic, she is passionate about the ability of literature to affect our lives and believes in the power of words as a tool for liberation. Jessica has a BA in Sociology from Trinity College in Hartford, CT, an MS in Urban Education from Mercy College, NY and an MA in English from the Bread Loaf School of English, VT (Middlebury College). She has opened for Martín Espada at the Lawrence Jazz and Poetry festival and was part of the Acentos writing collective in the Bronx, NY, once serving as a guest writing facilitator. She was co-editor of the Bread Loaf Journal for 3 years which featured poetry and short stories from across the Bread Loaf campuses. Jessica is also an active and current member of the Andover Bread Loaf Lawrence Collective. For all things Tarot and Reiki related you can find Jessica @kikareadstarot on Instagram, for all things Ernabelle (her cat), books, and family life you can follow her @purpletherapy on Instagram.
