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Volume 3, Number 1 - Fall 2004
People & Stories Heads to Libraries Across the Nation -
NEH
grant funds project
by Lenora Kandiner
People and Stories—Gente y Cuentos is on the road. Thirteen libraries, from California to Kansas, are now running programs in Spanish and English, thanks to a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
The 30-month project aims to create new audiences for literature as a tool for enhancing life. “The collaboration is a perfect fit,” said People and Stories—Gente y Cuentos Executive Director Patricia Andres. “Like libraries, People and Stories—Gente y Cuentos aims to create inclusion, access and community in a world where everyone is welcome and books are central.”
In awarding the grant, Nancy E. Rogers, Director of the Division of Public Programs for the NEH, said that People and Stories—Gente y Cuentos “is an excellent project designed to encourage adults and young adults to enjoy reading and to think critically about what they have read.”
Eight libraries—in California, Connecticut, Florida, Nevada, Texas and New York—are running programs in Spanish, and five—in Florida, Kansas and Texas—are doing them in English. Libraries in additional states will join the program in 2005.
Two teams of scholars—one in English, one in Spanish—worked with Andres and founder Sarah Hirschman to select stories and develop detailed study guides that highlighted poetic and experiential elements of the texts and included questions for guiding discussions. “We chose stories that readers usually can relate to,” Andres said. “We wanted to include a diversity of writers in terms of gender, ethnicity and style as well.”
Early this year, Andres trained librarians in San Diego and Princeton, teaching and modeling the People and Stories—Gente y Cuentos method and giving the librarians a chance to practice facilitating groups.
"They enjoyed being participants themselves, and they were very interested in thinking about which audiences to invite.” Some librarians worked with social service organizations in their areas to recruit specific groups, such as teens in an alternative school, ESL students or homeless adults.
Across the country, these audiences and others have responded powerfully to the program. In a small town library in Louisburg, Kansas, youth services librarian Elizabeth Ellis worked with a group of teens who had been expelled from public school. They remarked that Ellis was the first adult who really listened to their thoughts and treated them with respect.
In Florida, Hialeah librarian Maria Casado said that the participants “could freely talk about issues in their lives that were described somehow in the short stories we read.”
“We are hoping now to expand in the states where NEH has given us a strong start, working with state library organizations and state humanities councils,” said Andres.