Join us for an engaging reading and talk with acclaimed writer Luis J. Rodriguez as we discusses the intersection of art and activism, the need for community, and the importance of connecting with our indigenous past.  A short question and answer period will follow.

Luis Rodriguez is the former Poet Laureate of Los Angeles (2014 – 2106) and the author of 15 books in all genres. His best-selling memoir Always Running: Gang Days in L.A was a New York Times notable book and has been included on school reading lists nationwide. The work’s sequel, It Calls You Back, was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Throughout his writing, Rodriguez addresses complex and vital issues of race, class, gender, gang life, and how to transform personal rage through storytelling and dialogue. He has helped found numerous organizations, including Chicago’s Guild Complex, which is one of the largest literary organizations in the Midwest; Rock-a-Mole Productions, which produces music and art festivals; and Youth Struggling for Survival, a community group that works with gang and non-gang youth. Rodriguez is also the founder of Tia Chucha Press and Tia’s Café and Centro Cultural, a bookstore, coffee shop, art gallery, performance space, and workshop which seeks to transform community in Los Angeles’s San Fernando Valley and beyond through ancestral knowledge, the arts, literacy, and creative engagement. His honors include a Hispanic Heritage Award for Literature, the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Writers’ Award, and a California Arts Council Fellowship. He was one of 50 leaders worldwide selected as “Unsung Heroes of Compassion,” presented by the Dalai Lama. Luis has written for The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, The Nation, US News & World Report, The Guardian (UK), American Poetry Review, Fox News Latino, The Huffington Post, and elsewhere. He leads workshops, readings, and talks in public and private schools, universities, prisons, juvenile lock-ups, homeless shelters, Native American reservations, and conferences of all kinds.

A Reading and Discussion with Luis J. Rodriguez