Book Discussion: The Undocumented Americans, by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Details
August 24, 2021: 6:30 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
Class will be held via Zoom. Zoom information will be emailed to registrants prior to class start time.
Writer Karla Cornejo Villavicencio was on DACA when she decided to write about being undocumented using her own name. She wrote her immigration lawyer’s phone number on her hand in Sharpie and embarked on a trip across the country to tell the stories of her fellow undocumented immigrants – and to find the hidden key to her own story. The result is a combination of sensitive reporting and powerful personal narratives of “people who don’t inspire hashtags or t-shirts”. Instead she writes about day laborers, housekeepers, construction workers, dog walkers, and deliverymen while telling her own experiences and those of her Ecuadorian parents. The stories she tells are not deferential or naively inspirational but show the love, magic, heartbreak and insanity that infuse the day-to-day lives of her subjects.
The Book and Author:
- National Book Award and Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist.
- Included in Best Books of the Year (2020) in New York Times Book Review, NPR, Time, New York Public Library and Library Journal.
- Author is one of the first undocumented immigrants to graduate from Harvard and is currently a doctoral candidate in the American Studies program at Yale University.
Presented by: Katie O’Laughlin, Managing Librarian, Reference & Research
Registration fee: FREE
