Time again for Word Up, our weekly roundup of talks and readings.
TUESDAY
Tongo Eisen-Martin is a movement worker and educator who has organized against mass incarceration and extra-judicial killing of Black people throughout the United States. He has educated in detention centers from New York’s Rikers Island to California’s San Quentin State Prison, and his work in Rikers Island was covered by the New York Times. Don’t miss the New York City release of his new book of poems, Someone’s Dead Already. Tuesday, July 28 at 7 p.m. Nuyorican Poets Café, 236 East 3rd Street (East Village). Admission $10 at the door, $7 with student ID.
As a gay American-Iranian, Abdi Nazemian couldn’t escape the feeling that his viewpoint was not one oft-represented in popular culture. His debut novel,The Walk-In Closet, seeks to rectify that—using a straight white female main-character called Kara Walker as an entry point into the lives of the Iranian-American elite. The book traces the close friendship between Kara and Bobby Ebadi—a gay man whose Iranian-American family welcome Kara to the intoxicating fold as Bobby’s girlfriend. Sooner or later, the truth must emerge—with raucous results. Abdi will be in conversation withStacey Vanek Smith, a senior reporter at Marketplace.
Icy and Sot’s exterior mural. (Photos: Sara Afzal)
Iranian exiles Icy and Sot brought together the two communities they know best by organizing two simultaneous gallery openings on Friday night, one in Brooklyn featuring 10 Iranian street artists and the other in Tehran, showcasing 35 NYC-based graffiti artists. More →
Clockwise: Arash Farazmand, Siavash Karampour, Soroush Farazmand, Ali Eskandarian and Koory Mirz. (Photo: Yellow Dogs Facebook page)
The tragic killings of two members of Iranian expat band The Yellow Dogs rocked the local and national media outlets yesterday. Across the world, Iranian musicians were just as hard-hit by the news. “We were all shocked,” Sam Solino, keyboardist of the Tehran-based prog-rock band Liberty Square, told us in a Facebook message last night. More →
TUESDAY
