Arizona:
• Starting this week, several books by Latino authors can no longer be used in classes in the Tucson, Arizona, school district so the district could keep millions of dollars in funding after the state banned ethnic studies. The blog Remezcla profiles the books, including Occupied America: A History of Chicanos by Rodolfo F. Acuña and Critical Race Theory: An Introduction by Richard Delgado. (Héctor Tobar wrote about Acuña in the Los Angeles Times last year.) Salon, the online magazine, published a good overview about the issue. In this article from the Indian Country website, teachers and students talk about how the ban has affected them. The news was the topic of discussion between writers Dagoberto Gilb and S.J. Rivera on the Nuestra Palabra radio show, which you can find on its Facebook page.
Roberto Bolaño
• The New Yorker has a short story called “Labyrinth” by the late Roberto Bolaño in its current issue. The website included an interview with one of his editors, Willing Davidson, and includes a mention of Francisco Goldman.
Cuban refugess
• Here’s an interesting article from the Marin Independent-Journal about a woman who found out about her family’s heritage through Cuban author Carlos Eire’s 2010 book, Learning to Die in Miami: Confessions of a Refugee Boy. NPR profiled Eire when the book first come out.
This post was updated to include a link to Bolaño’s short story.
The Hispanic Reader 