(San Francisco, CA) In celebration of its 35th anniversary, the Asian Pacific American Librarians Association (APALA) will hold a one-day symposium entitled “Building Bridges: Connecting Communities through Librarianship & Advocacy” at the University of San Francisco’s McLaren Conference Center on Thursday, June 25th, 2015.
“We are celebrating and commemorating this milestone in a city that has a deep history and strong presence of Asian Pacific Islanders,” said Gary Colmenar, one of the co-chairs of the APALA 35th Planning Committee. “We are holding this symposium to reflect the work APALA has done in the past and continues to do so. The theme for the symposium reflects what we have been doing to accomplish the organization’s mission. We serve as a bridge between library, archives and museum professionals with the APA communities.” The APALA Symposium will be held right before the American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conference and Exhibition, June 26-30, at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. Additional programs and cultural events are slated during the ALA Annual Conference, June 26-30.
The keynote speaker is Valarie Kaur, an award-winning documentary filmmaker, civil rights lawyer, and interfaith leader who centers her work on storytelling for social change. She has led campaigns on hate crimes, racial profiling, immigration detention, marriage equality, solitary confinement, and the open Internet. Valarie Kaur believes “the way we make change is just as important as the change we make.” She currently serves as Media and Strategy Fellow at Stanford Law School.
Founded in 1980 by librarians of diverse Asian and Pacific ancestries, APALA has long been committed to supporting and providing greater visibility for Asian / Pacific American (APA) professionals in the areas of libraries, archives, and museums (LAMs) and advancing services to APA communities.
Early bird registration starts January 27, 2015 and ends April 3, 2015
For more information, updates, and registration, visit http://apala35th.apalaweb.org/
Event Details:
Who: Asian Pacific American Librarians’ Association (APALA)
What: 35th Anniversary Symposium entitled “Building Bridges: Connecting
Communities through Librarianship & Advocacy”
When: Thursday, June 25th, 2015, 8:00 A.M. to 7:30 P.M.
Where: University of San Francisco’s McLaren Conference; Registration
required
Attached: Keynote speaker Valarie Kaur – biography
Valarie Kaur
Valarie Kaur is a civil rights lawyer, documentary filmmaker, and faith-rooted organizer who helps communities tell their stories and organize for social change. She has made award-winning films and led multimedia campaigns on a wide range of issues: hate crimes against Sikh and Muslim Americans, racial profiling, gun violence, marriage equality, immigration detention, and solitary confinement. Valarie is a regular television commentator on MSNBC and opinion contributor toCNN, NPR, PBS, The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, and The New York Times. She has reported on the military commissions at Guantanamo and clerked on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Valarie founded Groundswell Movement of 100,000 members, the nation’s largest multi-faith online organizing community known for “dynamically strengthening faith-based organizing in the 21st century.”
A Senior Fellow at Auburn Seminary, she serves as a national Sikh voice who teaches on movement-building for students, organizers, and interfaith groups. She also works with the U.S. State Department to bring these tools to activists around the world, most recently traveling and teaching throughout Myanmar. She earned degrees at Stanford University, Harvard Divinity School, and Yale Law School, where she founded the Yale Visual Law Project to train future lawyers to make films for social and policy change. She is currently the Media and Strategy Fellow at Stanford Law School, where she helps build the movement to keep the Internet free and open, especially for under-served communities.
The Center for American Progress lists Valarie among 13 national progressive faith leaders to watch. She has been called “a standout figure in the world of interfaith organizing and activism and one of eight Asian American “Women of Influence.” A prolific public speaker on college and university campuses, she was also the youngest to deliver the Baccalaureate Commencement Address at Stanford University.
Valarie lives with her husband and filmmaking partner Sharat Raju and their baby boy Kavi Singh in Los Angeles. She believes that “the way we make change is just as important as the change we make.”
For more information on Valarie, visit her website at http://valariekaur.com/. You can also follow her on Twitter at @valariekaur.
Attached: APALA35th Press Release [pdf]