OK.
Thanks to everyone for coming out tonight.
This series is called The Poetics and Politics of Water.
It's a series that Professor Ofelia Zepeda and I
organized in connection with a graduate class this spring.
The series explores how water works
in contemporary American Indian writing.
The writer's reading in the series
are custodians and stewards of Indigenous conceptions
of water.
And through their words, their creativity,
they can help us to think more deeply
about an element in our lives that we just can't do without.
We have many people to thank.
First and foremost, I'd like to thank our primary sponsors,
the Department of English, the American Indian Studies
program, and the University of Arizona Poetry Center.
These organizations have given, not only resources,
but time and real labor to making
this event and others possible.
In addition to those, others who have helped us out
are, the American Indian language Development Institute,
the Institute of the Environment, the Southwest
Center, the College of Social and Behavioral Science,
and the Confluence Center.
Thanks, thanks to all the sponsors.
And thanks too, to the students in our class
for your engagement, your ideas, and this afternoon,
for the wonderful food that you prepared for tonight's speaker.
Upcoming, as Tyler mentioned, we have
Natalie Diaz as the fourth reader in our series.
She's reading on Thursday, April 2nd.
We've added a final event thanks to the help
of Robert Hershey and others.
We're going to have a roundtable discussion on The Poetics
and Politics of Water with three panelists, James Anaya, who's
a Regents Professor at the College of Law
here at the U of A, Jim Enote, who
is the executive director of the Museum at Zuni Pueblo.
And thirdly, Charles Wilkinson, who is a regents,
or a distinguished professor I think
they're called, at the University of Colorado,
Boulder.
It should be a very exciting roundtable discussion
on water issues, and that will be on Wednesday, not Thursday
night, but Wednesday, April 15, 7 o'clock, same place.
Finally, I'd like to mention two opportunities.
We have prepared a finer version of our poster in, kind of,
a limited edition.
All of these posters have been signed by the previous two
speakers.
And we hope that our speaker tonight
will do the same, as will Natalie, April 2nd.
So you have an opportunity to have a signed poster by all
of the poets in the series.
I think we're selling those for $25 over on this table,
and the proceeds from the sale of this poster
will go to benefit graduate students in the American Indian
Studies program.
Also, the Tohono O'odham Student Association
has set up a table back there, they're waving.
So if you would like to have some dessert
or a little something after the reading,
please, please help them out.
Finally, I'd like to recognize the artist who
created our poster.
I just notice that he walked in, Paul Mirocha
did the artwork here.
OK, so without further ado, I'd like
to now introduce Ofelia Zepeda, who will introduce our speaker.
Been dying to say that.