Date: Thursday, April 10
Time: 7 p.m.
Location: UNLV Student Union Ballroom
Details: Free and open to the public. Q&A session will follow the reading
Acclaimed human rights activist and writer Gerda Weissmann Klein will read selections of her work during a free public lecture April 10, at 7 p.m., in the UNLV Student Union Ballroom. Author of the memoir "All But My Life," Gerda Weissmann Klein is a Holocaust survivor and an internationally renowned spokesperson on issues of human rights. Her book was also the basis for the Academy Award-winning documentary "One Survivor Remembers." She now works through her own foundation, the Gerda and Kurt Klein Foundation, to bring topics that teach justice and tolerance to students in the United States and around the world.
The event is part of the "Just Voices" project, an innovative community partnership that brings prize-winning authors of conscience into Clark County High Schools and to the UNLV campus during Social Justice Month (April). Books by Gerda Weissmann Klein, and other "Just Voices" authors, Ana Castillo and Dan Chaon, have been approved by the Clark County School District and purchased by the sponsors so that more than 800 students can share in an innovative reading experience centered on themes of social justice. The readings culminate in classroom visits and meetings with the authors.
Upcoming 'Just Voices' readings:
Ana Castillo, acclaimed author and activist
Date: Tuesday, April 15
Time: 7 p.m.
Location: UNLV Student Union Ballroom
Details: Free and open to the public
Dan Chaon, National Book Award finalist
Date: Tuesday, April 25
Time: 7 p.m.
Location: UNLV Student Union Ballroom
Details: Free and open to the public. Q&A session will follow the reading
The "Just Voices" project also runs a class for teachers through UNLV's Department of English and the Southern Nevada Regional Development Program. The class provides Clark County high school teachers involved in "Just Voices" an opportunity for in-depth study of the writers' works, along with one-on-one time with the authors in preparation for in-class visits. The classes are in part also sponsored by the Dean's Office of the Lied Library at UNLV. Now in its third year of implementation as a community partnership in Las Vegas, "Just Voices" is fast becoming known as one of the most innovative writers-in-the-schools literary activism teaching projects in the nation.
"Just Voices" and the public readings at UNLV are sponsored by Nevada P.I.E., the Department of English at UNLV, Educational Outreach at UNLV, the Clark County School District, the Governor's Advisory Council on Education Relating to the Holocaust, and by generous donations from Fontainebleau Resorts and the Dr. Miriam and Sheldon G. Adelson Family Foundation.
For more information, please contact the UNLV English Department at 895-3533.
