Located on the first floor of Hayden Library, the Luhrs Arizona Reading Room is a reading room that is open to all. An interactive collections exhibit space invites visitors to explore the scope and variety of print collections pertaining to Arizona.
Black Speculative Fiction
This book collection serves as a compendium to the exhibit celebrating the understanding of the umbrella term Black Speculative Fiction and its representation within the Fantasy, Science Fiction, Horror, and (Alternate) History fiction genres.
Black Speculative Fiction uses forward-looking perspectives from Black and African creators to imagine a better future for Black and African American people across the globe. With these new identities created by the Diaspora through Black Speculative Fiction, we reclaim our erased and colonized identities and reckon with the horrors wrought upon us by the legacy of colonialism. Our contested place in history is reimagined and used as a blueprint to seize our identity and future as Black and African American people.
This book collection also supports the Griots and Galaxies podcast, which examines Black Speculative Fiction as a tool for social and technological change. The podcast is a production in partnership with the Center for Science and the Imagination at Arizona State University and includes publications by two of its podcast hosts, Chinelo Onwualu and Yvette Lisa Ndlovu.
CantoMundo presents Latinx Poetry
CantoMundo is a national poetry organization that cultivates a community of Latinx poets through workshops, symposia, public readings, and publications.
CantoMundo's dedication to Latinx poets and poetry among a diverse range of Latinx communities seeks to nurture generations of bi- and multi-lingual writers and readers. Since 2010, we have hosted annual retreats and regional readings and workshops and have partnered with organizations focused on immigrant rights, veteran support, and young writers to bring poetry to new communities and to bring new voices and aesthetics to American poetry. CantoMundo is currently housed at the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing at Arizona State University.
Cardboard House Press: Bilingual Poetry in Arizona
/poetry in translation/
Cardboard House Press is dedicated to the creation of Spanish-English bilingual spaces through small-press publishing, community workshops, and bilingual events. Based in Phoenix, Arizona, and founded in 2014, the press specializes in publishing Latin American and Spanish poetry in translation, with a special interest in contemporary documentary, social, and conceptual poetics, ecopoetry, and the historical avant-garde. Cardboard House’s editions have used a variety of printing techniques, including silkscreen, linocut, stencil, letterpress, and digital printing. Some of the titles are bound with recycled cardboard in community workshops, following in the tradition of the cartonera publishing movement in Latin America. Cardboard House Press’ catalogue includes authors from Argentina, Cuba, Chile, Ecuador, Spain, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, Puerto Rico, and Uruguay.
/poesía en traducción/
Cardboard House Press está dedicada a la creación de espacios bilingües (español-inglés) a través de la publicación independiente, talleres comunitarios y eventos bilingües. Con sede en Phoenix, Arizona, y fundada en el 2014, la editorial se especializa en la publicación de poesía latinoamericana y española en traducción al inglés, con especial interés en las poéticas contemporáneas documentales y conceptuales, ecopoesía y de la vanguardia histórica. Varias de las ediciones de Cardboard House Press se imprimen de forma mixta: en serigrafía, linóleo, esténcil, imprenta de tipos móviles y digital. Algunas de ellas se encuadernan con cartones reciclados en talleres comunitarios, siguiendo con la tradición del movimiento de editoriales cartoneras de Latinoamérica. El catálogo de Cardboard House Press incluye autores de Argentina, Cuba, Chile, Ecuador, España, Guatemala, México, Perú, Puerto Rico y Uruguay.
Luhrs Arizona Reading Room Collection
An open stack collection in the Luhrs Arizona Reading Room features books and materials concerning Arizona and the southwest region. Materials in this collection reflect the Greater Arizona Collection, the Chicano/a Research Collection and the Labriola National American Indian Data Center.
#Landback
Indigenous Peoples are deeply connected to the lands they come from. Our spirituality, language, songs, stories, and ways of life express our relationships with our lands. At all ASU campuses, you are on Akimel O’oodham je:ved (O’odham word translating to land/Earth). Due to the lack of settler consciousness in today’s society, the Indigenous #LandBack movement is a way to assert Indigenous sovereignty through political advocacy and direct action. The goals of the Land Back movement align with past Native activist movements like the Red Power movement of the 1960s and 1970s, #IdleNoMore in 2012, and #NoDAPL in 2016, to name a few. These movements sought to protect Indigenous land and culture by any means necessary. Since many students may not be aware of contemporary Indigenous cultures and activism, Labriola would like to continue to celebrate, acknowledge, and educate our University about efforts like #LandBack. We feel our heritage should be celebrated beyond Native American Heritage Month. Labriola Center’s mission with this display is to share crucial contemporary contributions to Indigenous Peoples to society. This book display consists of six different themes focused on Indigenous self-empowerment and self-determination. Indigenous and non-Indigneous people will gain a better understanding of Indigeneity and Indigenous resiliency, and of how we thrive in the 21st century.
Marching Forth: Stonewall Book Awards
Early on June 28, 1969, a police raid on the iconic Stonewall Inn sparked protests and demonstrations that helped define the modern LGBT+ rights movement. Although it was not the beginning of the LGBT+ rights movement, the Stonewall Riots were pivotal in setting the movement on a larger stage, leading to the formation of numerous activist groups and attracting hundreds of thousands of new activists into the fold.
The American Library Association (ALA)’s Rainbow Round Table was founded in 1970, originally designated as the Task Force on Gay Liberation. The following year, the first Stonewall Book Award was presented to Isabel Miller’s book entitled Patience and Sarah. Since its inception, the Rainbow Round Table has awarded at least one Stonewall Book Award yearly and recognized many more titles as Stonewall Honor Books. Now, an award is presented in each of the categories of Nonfiction, Literature, Poetry, and Children’s & Young Adult Literature.
This display highlights winners of the Stonewall Book Award from every era in celebration of LGBT+ representation and its evolution through history. Books from every genre are included in this collection, serving as a reminder that LGBT+ people are everywhere and deserve to be recognized.
Transcendent Voices: Perspectives Beyond the Binary
In celebration of Transgender Awareness Week, this collection seeks to highlight a diverse range of transgender, nonbinary, two-spirit, and other gender diverse experiences. Explore critical essay collections on how to craft a better world for trans and gender diverse individuals, provocative fiction and poetry that will make your heart ache, as well as graphic novels and memoirs that explore the unique challenges and triumphs within the community. These empowering works of passion, empathy, and solidarity shed light on not only the historical struggles of trans & gender diverse individuals, but the love and joy they experience in being their most authentic self.
Special thanks to the Rainbow Coalition, TransFam and the LGBTQ+ Faculty and Staff Association for their contributions in curating this collection.