S3, E7: The Power of Stories w/Donna Barba Higuera

In this episode*, we have the absolute honor of conversing with Donna Barba Higuera, Middle Grade and Picture Book Author, Newbery Medal and Pura Belpré Award Winner and New York Times Best Seller. Donna shares from where and whom she draws her stories, and how she went from an imaginative child to inspiring readers of all ages.

In a time where book challenges are on the rise, Donna discusses the importance and power of sharing stories, owning the stories you hear and having access to stories representing all kinds of readers.

*A follow-up conversation was had between Donna, Ericka and Pia live on stage at the Association of Library Services to Children (ALSC) National Institute on September 21, 2024 in Denver, Colorado. The theme of the Institute was Standing up for Stories, and the hosts were able to dig deeper into the stories shared in this conversation and Donna, in turn, asked questions of the hosts about the power of sharing voices and experiences on the podcast. Unfortunately, there were sound quality issues with that recording and in the end it was not able to be saved. Pia and Ericka share a small reflection on both conversations at the end of this episode.

Date of interview: August 27, 2024
Date of post interview reflection: October 16, 2024
Host(s): Ericka Brunson-Rochette & Pia Alliende
 
Additional Info. & Links:
Donna's website-https://www.dbhiguera.com/
2024 ALSC National Institute-https://www.ala.org/alsc/confsce/institute 

Transcript

(Intro Music Playing)

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:             
Hello and welcome to OVERDUE, a podcast produced by the Oregon Library Association's EDI and Anti-Racism Committee. My name is Ericka Brunson-Rochette. I use she/her pronouns. And I am a librarian living in central Oregon. I am joined today by former committee co-chair and guest host, Pia.

Pia Alliende:                                      
 Hello, I'm Pia Alliende and my pronouns, she/here. I'm a district librarian at Redmond School District also in central Oregon.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:            
Yay. And today, we are so excited to welcome award-winning author and storyteller extraordinaire, Donna Barba Higuera, to the show. According to her website, Donna's middle grade and picture books are about kids who find themselves in odd or scary situations. From language to cultural differences and being biracial, life can become complicated. I know that I, for one, can relate to some of the real-life complications and wish there had been more books like Donna's available to me when I was a child. So, thank you so much for your contributions to youth literature, Donna, and for joining us on OVERDUE today.

Donna Barba Higuera:                   
Thank you for inviting me. You two are some of my favorite people. I'm so happy to be here.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:             
The feeling is mutual.

Pia Alliende:                                       
Yes, it's OVERDUE. I'm going to get started today with our first question, which is kind of like the icebreaker. So, do you have any memories from visiting the library as a child that have stuck with you?

Donna Barba Higuera:                        
Oh, my goodness, so many and so many that in the past few years have just come back very vividly for me. So, when I was growing up in the local library, my mother and father were school teachers, so they would take my sister and I on the weekend was when we would go. And the local librarian was Mrs. Hughes. I didn't know her first name until recently. I had to look her up and find her. Her name's Harriet.

So, Harriet Hughes was the local library and she would not just read to us, but she would act out. She was almost like a thespian and she would act out plays and she had this little sidekick, which was I think a soup can that she had wrapped and made a little suit for this soup can and had a little head on him. And his name was Larry Library. And Larry Library would tell the stories with her almost like a little tiny ventriloquist dummy that she did.

And so, I have so many vivid childhood memories of Mrs. Hughes reading stories with Larry Library. And he would chime in and have comments sometimes on the stories. And I thought a lot about Larry Library and Mrs. Hughes over the years. And I don't want to go too much into this, but Mrs. Hughes and Larry Library are still out there and it just is such a wonderful thing for me. But I had to search for them and I'm like, I'm sure Larry's in a landfill somewhere. But no, he is still sitting alongside with Harriet Hughes and she's over 100 now. And it's just such a vivid memory of my childhood that I wish everybody could have Mrs. Hughes and Larry Library.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:         
That's amazing. I never know where that question's going to lead, but I can
promise I didn't have a Larry Library like a soup can on my bingo card for library experiences growing up, but that's amazing. Did Larry talk with the soup can lid?

Donna Barba Higuera: 
No. He had a plastic head, so it was really just Mrs. Hughes talking, but he came alive for me, so I never noticed. And she was not a ventriloquist, so her mouth was moving, but it was so convincing to me as a child that he was his own entity and I just didn't even notice her mouth moving. His mouth never moved, but he was speaking and he was real to me.

And as a child, our imaginations are so vivid that in a way, I imagined him moving and speaking, but he never did. He was a soup can with a plastic head, but my imagination along with Mrs. Hughes' stories and her acting through Larry made him a real, he was a real boy.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:          
Sounds like it. That's a wonderful story.

Pia Alliende:                     
Yeah. Very good. I didn't have libraries when I grew up, so maybe when I was 10, I went to the school library that was not ... My dad was my library.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette              
Yeah. I had an interesting relationship with libraries growing up too, but they ended up being a really integral part of my life clearly. But I don't have those quintessential, "Oh, I remember going to story time" and having that Mrs. Hughes connection when I was super young. So, I always really cherish folks that have those special connections that they've made with their libraries and librarians. So, I've got our next question for you, Donna. And this one's maybe a big one, I guess it depends, we'll see where you take it. When did you first realize that you were a storyteller?

Donna Barba Higuera:  
 I don't know if I figured it out yet. I think I still figure it out because I view storytelling in a very different way. And I've had to learn that my definition of storytelling isn't always what someone else's is. I think that while I was writing The Last Cuentista, I still thought of myself as a writer and it was very technical and I was putting things together. But as I was writing it, there were stories that are traditionally told, and part of the story is the main character Petra is retelling the stories in her own way and becoming a storyteller.

Well, in order to do that, I had to make up the stories in my own mind and Petra's telling these stories through me, or I'm telling them through Petra, I should say. But as I was writing it, I still had all these self-doubts like, "Well, I'm not a good enough storyteller. My dad's a great storyteller. My grandmother was an amazing storyteller, but certainly I'm not a good enough storyteller." And I felt inadequate to call myself a storyteller.

But I think now maybe I'm starting to think of myself that way because I'm realizing that I can. All of these books that I write are made up stories and people think of them as stories. So, I suppose that makes me a storyteller. But as a kid, I remember making things up from a very young age, really young. I would come in the house and tell my parents things that I had seen that I really hadn't seen. I was constantly seeing aliens and UFOs and fairies and what have you.

And I thought I was lying. And I knew in my mind I was lying and I knew I was making up a story, but I was also raised very traditionally in a Baptist church, and that's lying. And so, as a kid I'm like, "Man, am I telling stories? Because I thought they were fun. Or am I a liar and I'm going to hell?" So, I think I just now am like, okay, maybe I'm a storyteller. I don't think I'm going to go to hell for writing these books and telling these stories.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:    
I don't know if I have the authority to call that, but I don't think so. I think plenty of us from the outside definitely view you as a storyteller.

Donna Barba Higuera:        
Yeah. Everyone pray for me.

Pia Alliende:                        
Well, and actually the next question I think that you touched a little bit about it because at the end, you own the stories that you hear. And if you don't tell them, nobody can know about them.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:        
And who's going to know that aliens landed, if you don't tell it.

Pia Alliende:                        
I know a little bit about it. I have seen presentation that you have had with students, but which one are the one that stand out stories that you have heard or read as a child that shape inspired how you create your own stories?

Donna Barba Higuera:   
Well, I think for sure books I can very specifically say change the way that I make up stories in my mind and then write the stories. The first time I remember was Mrs. Hughes gave me a Wrinkle in Time, and when I read it, I was like, "Oh my gosh, this is amazing." And it opened up my love for science fiction. But even around that time, I was reading the Chronicles of Narnia and the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings and things that were fantastical and took me to other worlds.

 I grew up in this tiny little desert town. And these stories allowed me to go places that I never could have imagined, places that were green and snowy and beautiful and unlike what I normally experience. But I also, I was a sci-fi kid. I grew up watching the Twilight Zone and Star Wars and Star Trek and those types of stories allowed me to escape my ordinary world and go from this dusty little town to outer space.

And it wasn't just books, it was TV and we didn't have streaming, so we had to wait one week at a time to see what was happening next. But I think there are so many children who they don't have to be from dusty little towns. They can be from anywhere, and they want to escape their ordinary circumstance. Maybe school isn't always great, maybe home isn't always great, they just want to go other places.

And as a reader, that's where I wanted to go. But I think kids get to decide what they gravitate toward and what they want to read and where they want to escape to. But for me, those were the books that were huge for me.

Pia Alliende:                       
But Donna, yet your picture books are about something else. Like Cucuy and the Yellow Handkerchief is not science fiction, is something, well, I don't know what Cucuy meant. We'll see. But did you hear those stories?

Donna Barba Higuera:      
[inaudible 00:10:55]. El Cucuy is real.

Pia Alliende:                   
I know the kids always tell me that, that they have seen it, I mean, or the Yellow Handkerchief?

Donna Barba Higuera:  
Yeah. Well, The Yellow Handkerchief, there's nothing really, it's a picture book and it's about my relationship with my grandmother, and there's nothing magical or sci-fi or fantastical about it, which is why I didn't think it would ever be published. It was just a story I wrote for myself and to digest some of my complicated emotions with my grandmother.

                                             
But it's a story of a girl who, her grandmother comes to town and her old rusty pickup truck, and her grandmother really doesn't speak English well. And her grandmother looks different than the other grandmothers. She cooks differently. She speaks, eats, dresses everything differently than the other grandmothers. And it's about this young girl's complicated emotions toward her grandmother, which at first, it's embarrassment. And then when it gets to the point where, sorry, I'll pause for a second. My dog is snoring. Can you hear it?

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:
I love it. You don't even have to pause. That is just so cute. She's so sweet.

Donna Barba Higuera:         
Poppy the snorry dog.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:       
Poppy wants to be part of the podcast.

Donna Barba Higuera:        
She should. Yeah. She's like the calm, peaceful background noise, the little rough [inaudible 00:12:32].

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:         
We all need that. We really do.

Donna Barba Higuera:     
There's a picture book, but Poppy the Snoryy Dog. But with my grandmother, there came a point when I learned to appreciate her and I was like, oh, my gosh. In so many ways, she is more magical and interesting than the other grandmothers to me. And she was a storyteller.

And the things about her that I was once embarrassed by became the things that I loved the most about her, but I didn't know. But I think a lot of kids feel that way. And I think this is a book that gives children permission to go, oh, I am embarrassed, but I don't have to be, or it's okay to have those emotions.

Pia Alliende:                       
Did you hear El Cucuy through her or?

Donna Barba Higuera:         
So, I thought I was the only kid with an El Cucuy. I didn't know that the El Cucuy was a thing. Because my grandmother would describe El Cucuy. And if you know anything about Mexican folklore, sometimes it's really messed up and it's really pretty scary. But I guess a lot of fairy tales are. They've been retold and watered down and softened.

But my grandmother told me that El Cucuy lived in the closet, but she also had a cactus pot in the room that I would stay in at her house. And he was hairy and had bloody fangs and claws and glowing eyes. And if you didn't eat your dinner, he would eat you. And if you didn't go to bed, he would come steal you away in the night. And so, then I couldn't sleep and I was horrified. But she was the one who told me this, and she was this tiny little adorable sweet woman who would tell me these horrific stories.

And so, when I was older, it was a writing prompt. I was learning to write picture books. It said, "Take the thing that frightened you the most as a child and make it adorable." And so, I was like, there is no way to make El Cucuy adorable. But I tried.

And so, I said, "Well, what else is really scary?" And I thought of a cousin who I had, whose name is that I'm on, and he had moved from Mexico when we were young. He was about, gosh, eight or nine I think we were. And he was really nervous. He didn't speak English. He was worried about his clothing and so many things. And I thought, "Gosh, that's just as scary as El Cucuy." And there are so many kids who understand that. So, I wrote this book about this boy Ramon who suddenly El Cucuy isn't so scary anymore because he's got other things to be frightened of.

Pia Alliende:                     
That's awesome. I really love those stories.

Donna Barba Higuera:        
Yeah. And the book, take the thing that scared you the most and make it adorable, the illustrations are by Juliana Perdomo, and she's from Bogota Colombia, and she knows El Cucuy, but in Colombia, I think they say El Cuco or El Coco can't remember.

Pia Alliende:                      
But in Chile is El Cuco. And I know that in other countries it's El Coco.

Donna Barba Higuera:       
Yeah. It's different in different regions. But she knew exactly who he was and I knew it. It makes me so because coming from thinking I was the only one who was going to get eaten and devoured and stolen away, now everybody has this risk.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:         
I'm not alone. We're all going to get stolen.

Donna Barba Higuera:
Yeah. And we're all in trouble.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:  
We're in it together.

Pia Alliende:             
I witnessed a kid when you visit our libraries, school libraries, I witnessed a kid that got so amazed by the fact that, "Oh, do you speak Spanish también?" And he was having a personal conversation with you and El Cucuy has a design that has like a point toe or I don't know. And he was like, "Yes, that is this."

And then the librarian told me that was a kid that never paid attention to any story or anything. And it was just because it was the perfect example of how representation can make a kid visible. And he was like, "Okay, you guys, stop. I'm having a personal conversation with Donna." So, for him was really very important.

Donna Barba Higuera:
Well, and as you know, my Spanish isn't great. I do my best, but I can have a conversation pretty well. And so, I do a lot of visits for ESL and ESL classes as well. And it just has been so fun to watch kids who really are learning to speak English, but then they suddenly, because the book is also in Spanish, they can read it in Spanish, and they know and they feel like, "I have this in common with that woman up there who's trying really hard to speak and understand me."

And so, they get that those books are coming for them, and they're going to see themselves in books, and they're bogeyman books and things from their culture. And so, that makes me really happy when kids like that are so excited because they finally get to see and hear themselves.

Pia Alliende:                     
Exactly. Yeah.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:        
Which is a perfect segue into this next question, which is what role do you think the library, so it could be public libraries, school libraries, what role do you think the library should play in honoring and sharing stories?

Donna Barba Higuera:      
So, I'm a very literal thinker most of the time. And so, I picture the library itself. Obviously, it's a building. When you say the library, I guess I think of it as this, it's people, the people who create and are putting books in the hands of their patrons and the children. That's the library to me. There's a library building, but the library is, to me, it consists of people and the librarians who do that work.

And so, gosh, going back to the theme of it being complicated, it is, because not all librarians can be Harriet Hughes or Ericka Brunson-Rochette or Pia Alliende. Like any profession, it has to be people who are just so excited to be there and are enthusiastic about what they do and are thrilled when kids walk through the door or Mrs. Hughes has a huge smile on her face, knowing when I walk in and making me feel welcome, when there were sometimes places I didn't feel welcome, she made me feel welcome. And she knew books that I either needed to read or she thought I might like, and she would hand them to me.

That is what a library is to me. So, whether it's an elementary, middle school library or public or state library, it's the people who make up the library and knowing who their patrons are and being enthusiastic about it.

Pia Alliende:                   
Yeah, I know.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:         
I'm just thinking [inaudible 00:19:39] that are just really hard. Sometimes we're fighting right now for just keeping books on the shelves, having books accessible to children. We're fighting to allow every child to be able to see themselves in a book, in a space, in a collection.

                                             
And I just need to record that as a little sound snippet to listen to, to remind me, and hopefully I think other listeners out there, why we get up every day, why we do it. Because there is a Mrs. Hughes out there and there is a Donna out there. And do you still so fondly remember that sense of belonging and that sense of welcome-ness. I want every child, I want every person to be able to feel that in their life.

Pia Alliende:                  
Yeah. And in school libraries also is a question about behavior. Just because you are running around or it's like you don't shut them down. You just try to understand because usually kids, when they misbehave, it's because of something. It's not because they want to misbehave or because in some culture, it's more like you are noisier, is more noise or you talk different, or it's just because they're fighting for a book, for example. And then you have to understand that part.

But to move on the conversation is in your website bio, it mentions you calling dial-a-story over and over. Some libraries still use a version of this. Tell us about your favorite story feature.

Donna Barba Higuera:         
Oh, boy. So, again, I'd like to apologize to Mrs. Hughes for Dial story. So, I want to say it was Wednesday and I think what it was, it was just an old answering machine and it would answer after a certain number of rings and where you would normally have the recording, it would be Mrs. Hughes telling a story.

And I would get out of school and I lived up this hill from the school, and I'd run up the hill. And growing up in central California, it was so hot and I would just be sweating by the time I got home. And I would pull up the phone and back then, it was the rotary phone and it would be like, "Oh, please don't let another kid dial the number before me." And I would hang up and then I would dial it immediately again. And I don't know why I did that. I don't know if I thought it was a contest or if I wanted to hear the story to hear it again, to make sure that I hadn't lost a part. But I think this is one of the very, very first times that I called dial-a-story.

And it's so funny, childhood memories sometimes, we remember how something makes us feel as opposed to what really happened. And I remember it being really hot calling dial-a-story, and it was about a girl who got lost ... And I don't know the name of the story, and I wish I knew. I should probably see if I could write Mrs. Hughes and ask her because it's driving me crazy. But it's a girl who was in the snow and she was, I think lost in the forest and she found strawberries.

 And it was how it made me feel in that moment, growing up in this dusty little hot desert town. And there was a girl who was lost in a snowstorm and found strawberries. And so, it was, oh, my gosh, I just realized something. It was this moment where she felt lost and cold, but this moment also of hope where she found this strawberry where I think I felt like her strawberries are wonderful and magical and back as a kid, we didn't have that much fruit. It was expensive and not easy to come by. And I just realized in the book that I released last year, Alebrijes-

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:      
I was just thinking about this. I was thinking of that moment.

Donna Barba Higuera:         
I guarantee you that came from my subconscious. I'm just realizing that when I said it, the little girl Gabi, she and her brother pickpockets and at the market, she just wants a strawberry. And that's how the whole story begins. She steals a strawberry and they're caught. And so, things go downhill from there. But I think it was how that story made me feel. So, if that rings a bell.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette: 
Yeah. Well, you have the perfect audience for it.

Pia Alliende:                   
Exactly. I bet there will be somebody that is listening.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:    
Yeah. I wrote it down because it's going to be the first thing that I do after this interview is to try to find this book for you, Donna.

Pia Alliende:                      
Exactly.

Donna Barba Higuera:  
It's so funny because I've written Mrs. Hughes a few times, and I'll very meticulously in my neatest handwriting, I'll write her a letter and I'll date it and do it very properly, and then I'll send it to her and she'll mail back a response and she'll go, "You know I have an email address."

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:         
And you still are like, "I'm going to write her a letter and ask her about the girl in the forest with a strawberry." It's very sweet. Okay. I've got our next question here. We'd love if you would be willing to tell us about a situation that you encountered as a biracial child and how you later wove that into stories you created.

Donna Barba Higuera:        
Boy, there just are so many. I think it's a huge part of who I am as a writer. Your own life experiences find their way into your work no matter what. You can't help it. They just do. And a lot of times they're rewritten, for seriousness or humor or what have you.

But I remember, I guess the first story I remember writing or seeing, I remember writing and just snickering and laughing. It was so funny to me was I was writing Lupe Wong Won't Dance, and I was writing a scene that was based on some of my life experience, but also my daughters who are on top of my background, they're also Chinese.

And so, I wrote this scene in Lupe Wong, where her grandparents from one side of her family, her Mexican American grandmother is having dinner and her Chinese grandparents are there as well. And the humor when you have different cultures and the dueling grandmothers who are going to get their grandchildren to eat more of their food and some of the comments that happen and culturally the different ways that the grandparents view their grandchildren and the expectations of the grandchildren. And it was just so funny to me because it all has really happened.

And so, I let my kids read it and they thought it was so funny. They're like, "This is all real." And they're like, "But I never really looked at it this way and how funny it is." And I'm like, "Yeah, I don't think a lot of people see that." And in that situation, Lupe is dealing with a lot in her life, but she's got these expectations from her grandparents as well.

So, that was probably, I think the first one that I wrote, and it was funny. And one that I was really hesitant to write was in The Last Cuentista, was the relationship between Petra's mother, who is white and her grandmother, who is Mexican American. And that was based on my own life experience and my mother's relationship with my grandmother and how they just didn't understand one another.

And Petra was in that instance kind of like I was, where you love them both so much. You don't get as a child when you have multiple cultures and sometimes, they don't always see eye to eye, you can code switch and you can figure them both out, but you want them to love one another as much as you love them yourself. But that doesn't always happen.

And I saw that with my mother and my grandmother, and they were both these amazing, wonderful people who just didn't get one another. And it was one of my life regrets. And I even wrote in the book, I said, "If that comet had not destroyed Earth, maybe they would've figured it out." And in my life, it was just my grandmother got old and died and then my mother, and they just never had time to figure out their relationship. And that makes me sad.

Pia Alliende:                       
Yeah. I have to confess that your story about Lupe Wong and that is my favorite scene. I mean the mixed of the two of them. Because I mean, actually it's super real. I mean the way that when you describe it, I really enjoyed that part that I remember very vividly I mean the whole you. You managed to make it really very real and very colorful and very good. I mean, I can tell that that happened, because it was really taken from the heart.

Donna Barba Higuera:
Yeah. It was very much real life. And it's still like people ask all the time, "What is your favorite book that you've written?" And I said, "Depends on my mood. If I want to go laugh, I'll go read Lupe Wong Won't Dance." And I'll pick up that scene specifically. And by the end, I'm crying because I'm laughing because it's real.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette: 
And I think that it takes a specific type of talent to take something that some might call trauma, but real-life situations, these things that are interwoven into familial situations or growing up in cross-cultural families and to turn it into something that is both funny but that people can really relate to, I think that does take talent.

And I've got this small group of friends. We like to sometimes laugh about our traumas. We call it sad clowning. And that's what it reminds me of. And reading that book, I saw lots of the intricacies of how I walk through life as a biracial person, but I'm a biracial person that was adopted by a Black family. So, a lot of my interactions were having people who didn't identify as Black come into my life or come spend the night or interact with my family and just being so confused why things just don't seem like they are when I'm just with my family alone or when I'm just with my friends alone.

Donna Barba Higuera:     
Exactly, yes. Yeah. That was happened a lot with friends. My grandmother lived outside of town on a farm, and I would want my friends to come with me because I would go stay on the weekends, but it was almost like, "Do I give them a disclaimer before we go and explain how different things are then how I act here with them and what they're going to experience out there?" And I only had a few friends who ended up going and understood, but yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about.

Pia Alliende:                    
Yeah. Well, and since you talk about mood, I mean depending of your mood, it's like what you said that your favorite book is now with October that is steadily approaching, do you have a favorite scary story that you would recommend to youth services librarians?

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:  
Yeah. Spooky season.

Donna Barba Higuera:     
I'm trying to remember a book I read as a kid that was just so scary and this probably formed me. It's why I do not watch scary movies to this day. I don't read scary books, but I read Christine way before I should. So, I can't recommend that youth library services, but I don't know how young this book is. I read a book several years ago and it has just really stuck with me, and it was one of the first graphic novels I read is Anya's Ghost, I think. Is it Anya's Ghost?

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:  
I feel like I've read that.

Donna Barba Higuera:      
It was so creepy and haunting and sad. It was very multilayered, but it was called Anya's Ghost, and I cannot think of who the author is, but it's a book that is very complicated, but I want to say it was upper middle grade, low YA.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:          
Yeah. Is it Vera Brosgol or Brosgol?

Donna Barba Higuera:
Yes, yes, that's it. That's a great book. But again, it's creepy and it's exactly the kind of mood of a scary book that I love. It's very haunting. I think for younger books with my kids sometimes we would read Goosebumps, Goosebumps are great. But my husband wanted to go see the movie, so we went with one of our children and I was like ready to jump out of my state and get out of there. I can't even do Goosebumps. I'm just not a scary book person. I've written creepy things, but I always go to a public place to write descriptions. I'm a big scaredy-cat.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette: 
Surround yourself with people.

Donna Barba Higuera:       
Yeah, exactly. I think, and I've talked about this a lot when I do school visits, is I think as far as scary books are concerned, I always encourage kids to seek out local folklore or local lore in mythology in their own area. So, I've started, when I do presentations, I put up slides of creatures or ghost stories that are from their area and some of the kids know them and some of them don't. And I love that. I think I would encourage youth library service to look up what the local folklores in your own community and tell kids those stories.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:           
Yeah, for sure. I think that that scope goes beyond just learning and understanding where you live for kids, but extends to adults as well. How many stories do we have that are surrounding us at all times that we just haven't paused to listen?

Pia Alliende:                                     
I check in our catalog and we don't have Anya's Ghost and you won't believe how many kids just they ask in the school library, it's scary stories, scary stories. So, it's good to have stories that they're scary, that they're at their level so they can deal with fear. And I think it's something that helped them to process the idea of being scared in a way that at the end is you can, even the Little Red Riding Hood, you killed the wolf. I mean, it's dead. I mean, it's like you killed it. I don't know. I think it's a catharsis for kids.

Donna Barba Higuera:        
I agree. I think that's something that we have worried, kids can handle it. We have worried a little bit too much of trying to make stories palatable, but the kids are safe. If they're at school in a library or at home in their bed reading under the covers, they're in a safe space and it helps them to digest a story in an environment that they have control over. And so, I think it's important to let them read scary stories. And I was that kid, I mean, obviously reading Christine and books with flowers in the attic, I snuck and read.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:         
Same, same.

Donna Barba Higuera:      
Of course, I look back and go, "Oh, boy, yeah, that was a little ahead of time." But we need to let kids read those stories, so it helps [inaudible 00:35:43].

Pia Alliende:                              
And I think create the dialogue to talk about it because if they are really scared or they're having nightmares or whatever, instead of just shutting down and say, "You are not going to read this anymore," it's more like talk to them what's scaring you. Because I mean, I know that sometimes movies, I mean, there are some movies and my kids are the same way. We don't watch scary movies because we don't enjoy them. I mean, they're too terrifying, I guess. But if you talk about it, I think change the atmosphere of it, I mean creating the dialogue.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:   
And it also can help you walk through some of those real life scenarios too. Sometimes the things that we're afraid of in stories or in books are in a roundabout way connected to things that maybe are causing apprehension or fear in the real world as well. So, I think it's important to have those conversations.

                                       
But as a side note, I love scary things, scary books, scary movies, scary TV shows. Give them all to me. I also read Christine really early, Donna, but I also read everything by Stephen King, super early. There was one, I don't know why it scared me the most, out of all of his books. It's The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon. It's about this little girl who wanders away from her mother and brother in the woods. They're going on a hike and she is just obsessed with baseball.

                                             
And she's got this little transistor radio and she's listening to the broadcast. I think it's a Red Sox game, like any baseball librarian educator fans out there. And if I'm getting it wrong, I'm so sorry, but I think Tom Gordon was a player on the Red Sox. So, this is the only thing that she had when she was alone in the woods.

                                             
And then the battery starts running out and she can't listen to the game. And then the reality of where she is and her being alone conjures what is like a bogeyman. And I just thought it was such a cleverly crafted story, but I was too young to even really get the nuances of it. But I now have a pop-up book version of it that a friend got me. Yeah, she knew I loved that book.

Donna Barba Higuera:     
Yeah. I remember going as a kid, I think it was a Disney movie, it was called Escape from Witch Mountain. I went with my friends and I had to leave and they let me borrow the phone at the theater to call my parents because I was hyperventilating, crying, and it was Disney, I think Disney was the-

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:      
I love that movie.

Donna Barba Higuera:
What was it about it that scared me so badly? And I was like, "Get me out of here." So, yeah, I don't do scary.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:       
I think there are three different versions of that movie. And when you said they let you borrow a phone, it did turn kind of serious. I didn't want to adjust, but I was like, did you call dial-a-story? Let it calm you down.

Donna Barba Higuera:     
That would've probably been the right phone number to call to give me some peace in a moment. Yeah. There needs to be dial-a-story for grownups. So, yeah, we can have the moment.

Pia Alliende:                                    
My husband, when he was five, there are seven siblings, his grandpa took him to the movie theater to see Winnie-the-Pooh. And when Winnie-the-Pooh got stuck just to try to get the honey, he got scared and they have to leave the movie.

Donna Barba Higuera:       
Yeah. You don't know what triggers those emotions in yourself and people.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:     
Okay. So, we've had a lot of conversations about things that maybe scare us or things that evoke stronger emotions in us. But I have a question here about when you're sharing your stories with children, what has been the funniest thing a child has said or shared with you? And then to follow up on that, what has been something that has been really heartwarming as well?

Donna Barba Higuera:
Okay. I know right off the top of my head the funniest. It was funny to me, and part of it is because I was so nervous when I speak to younger crowds, kindergarten, first grade, second grade, I typically talk about my picture books. And so, I talk about El Cucuy. And so, I'm like, okay, so I can't really show them a picture or an image of the real El Cucuy because it's really horrifying and scary. So, I describe it a little bit. And I'm always really nervous that I'm going to scare a child and that it's not going to go well.

And this one day I can't remember, I could see the kids were nervous because I'm talking about the fangs and claws, and I'm like, "Okay, maybe I overdid it." And when I was done, this little boy walks up to me and he says, "Is El Cucuy real?" to me. And I said, "I don't know. What do you think?" And he goes, "I think he is, and I think I'm going to get myself one."

And he was probably, I think he must have been a first grader, but just his attitude was, I was so worried about frightening him and he took it to the next level. He's not afraid he's going to get one for himself.

Pia Alliende:                             
That's great.

Donna Barba Higuera:
And the little kids they're just so funny to me. I have so much fun with them because they're just brutally honest. They don't know me from someone on the corner, and they know that I'm there talking about books and that's all they know, and they're just so honest and they ask the most honest questions and they speak their honesty. And so, those are always the funniest visits or with the little ones.

But I guess the most heartwarming, there's so many. Every visit there's something where I connect with kids and like Pia said, kids who haven't seen themselves in books. But I can see when lights turn on, especially with middle schoolers, sometimes they're distracted or they've just had lunch and they want a nap or what have you.

But a lot of times, you can see when something comes on, the light turns on in their eyes and they have either thought of something that pertains to them or maybe they want to write or create something. But I was at the International Book Festival in Berlin in Germany, and it was just this massive auditorium, which it's intimidating, but I think every middle school in Berlin was there, and there were at least two to 3,000 people in this auditorium. And it was this stage with myself and the interpreter.

And while most of the kids there, they speak English as well. And so, it's partially in German and partially in English. And it was very interactive. It wasn't like a lot of visits where I'm speaking and they're just listening. It was very interactive where they got to ask the questions, but they also got to contribute.

And at one point, the moderator said, we had been talking about bogeymen, and I was talking about El Cucuy and how there are boogeymen from all over the world and how every culture has bogeymen, and that a lot of times, it's used to keep kids in line and to get kids to behave. And that's somehow where stories begin.

And the moderator said, "Does anybody out there want to share a story of a bogeyman?" That they've heard from a bogeyman from their culture, what have you? And there were a few kids who stood up, kids from Germany. And then there was one little boy in the very back, and he stood up and he walked up to the mic and he said, "My mother's from France and my father is from Syria, and they both have bogeymen, and they have both told the stories."

And he shared a little bit with them, and they both think that their bogeymen is scarier. And I saw his teacher was staring at him, and the kids were staring at him. And then he sits back down and I'm going to get emotional. So, I go to the front and this long signing line after the presentation, and his teacher gets to me and she says, "I wanted to share something with you." And I said, "Yeah." And she goes, "The little boy who stood up and said his mother was French and his dad was Syrian." I said, "Oh, yeah, I'm so glad." She goes, "He's never spoken in my class ever."

And he stood up in front of thousands of people because he felt empowered to share part of himself. And somebody asked, somebody took the time to ask him, and he got to share something special about himself and his dual cultures.

And so, that was something that it just has stuck with me that you just never know what kid you're going to reach and where they're going to go, "Wow, I can share my story and my story is just as important as her story or his story." And they feel empowered to do that, whereas before, they might've felt silenced. And so, it was a good reminder for me.

Pia Alliende:                          
Yeah. No, I mean I think that you always make that impact. And talking about that is like, it feels that all your books, and especially I have to say the Last Cuentista, they feel like it's striking reflection of what is happening in our schools and libraries today. Can you talk a little bit about the power of stories to counter effort by some in power to whitewash history through erasure, assimilation and manipulation of history? Or how can remembrance contribute to understanding an action?

Donna Barba Higuera:      
Oh, boy, that's a complicated question. I think if children and the patrons of libraries continue to read these stories and the librarians continue to share them and tell them whether it's in the oral tradition of storytelling like Larry Library and Mrs. Hughes or with books, even if there are going to be pockets of people who are successful in erasing stories or banning books or burning books, whatever they try to do, those stories are still going to be etched in people's minds in whether or not they repeat them in the oral tradition of storytelling or a young girl who just remembers snow and a strawberry. People are going to remember those.

So, no matter what happens with people trying to erase them, there are going to be people like yourselves and Mrs. Hughes who are going to ensure that that doesn't happen and that there are going to be people who 50 years later after the girl heard a story about a girl in the snow and a strawberry who is going to write it into a dystopian book. And those kids are going to become writers and creators and even adult patrons who have access to those things are going to become writers and creators.

And we have to just take a deep breath and keep going and just know that what we're doing now is going to carry on decades from now, and we're not always going to see the immediate results. It's going to be long, long from now when those things come to fruition and just keep going. And I think of what I do, and sometimes I don't feel so vocal because I hate confrontation.

So, I go, "Okay, I'm just going to keep writing and very subversively, I will put how I feel about things in my books and people will read them." And most of the time, I don't try to ever teach a lesson. In my books, I think that's just so patronizing. But I'm going to ask the questions and let people answer them for themselves and how they feel about things. It's good to ask questions.

Pia Alliende:                          
Yeah. That is the way to do it. I mean, because it's like what you said before, people wash things out. I mean, a story is a good story because wealth health, and of course, it's going to be your own ideas and values or whatever in there, but that is the power of them. I can have experienced exactly the same thing as you, but I'm not going to tell them as good as you tell them.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:  
I concur.

Pia Alliende:                             
We are all storytellers. Everyone has a story.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette: 
I just fumble my way through stories. So, this next question, I feel like it's got some ties and overlaps to what you were just sharing, but your science fiction books are notable not only for their accolades, but for how they counter the lack of representation of brown people in this particular genre. What's the importance of people from non-Western cultures seeing depictions of themselves in outer space? Is there a Mexican perspective to world building that differs from more traditional science fiction and fantasy?

Donna Barba Higuera:
When I was writing The Last Cuentista, because I realized there really wasn't a lot with Mexican American culture or Mexican culture in space. And so, I thought, "Okay, this book is never going to be published, but I want to write it for myself. This is me and I want to write stories I've heard and infuse them and weave together with my love of science fiction from when I was a young child." So, I did.

                                             
And while I don't think there are really Mexican spaceships, I think that I did what I needed to do to bring a culture into that world what made sense for me. And then of course when I wrote Alebrijes, which is the second in the series, it's more of a dystopian feel to it because we're back on a post-apocalyptic Earth, and I was able to show the culture that I wanted to survive, which is much where I had been, people of the Central Valley of California who are Mexican American, and many people are migrants from Oklahoma who came after the decibel. And so, that's what I brought into that book.

But I don't think I did it purposely. I think I was more so just embedding what I wanted to within a sci-fi world. But I know how to bring cultural things into those worlds, but Mexican sci-fi is not something I guess I ever had thought about. I was just putting characters into what I traditionally thought of as science fiction as a child. However, by doing that, kids who are reading it are going, "I can go to space."

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:          
I won't be left behind. My family, all of my brown and Black friends we get to go, too.

Donna Barba Higuera:          
Right. Everybody's welcome on this show. Come on in.

Pia Alliende:                        
Well, I think that that tied perfectly with the next question because it's like in many libraries and booksellers, they only promote author of colors during the national filling the blank month rather than highlighting their work as a great stories, period, like a great science fiction story, a great dystopian stories. And this lack of promotion could and often does affect library circulation and book sales. So, what do you think that libraries and booksellers might be lacking when it comes to promoting authors of color?

Donna Barba Higuera:
Oh, boy, this is a loaded question as well, because again, it comes back to who are the curators of these libraries and who building is the skeleton? What makes up the rest of the library? And it's not everybody can be a Harriet Hughes or Ericka Brunson-Rochette or Pia Alliende, and who's going to hand those books to people if it's not people who have that mindset of trying to let every reader read every kind of book. You don't have to just read books within your own culture. You want to read a little bit of everything.

And there is such power in handing a child a book that's maybe a little outside of their own experience and letting them learn. Why would you not want to expand your world and understand things from all different places and cultures and escape your little towns and go all over the world, which I think it just makes us better humans.But I think when it doesn't happen, it falls back on fear. I'm afraid to offend anybody. I guess I'm not afraid to offend anybody with this because I just think people need to read more, read outside your own experience. And that comes back to what this question is all about, just in that becomes understanding so you're not so afraid.

=And when you talk about libraries, there are also bookstores. I went into a bookstore that shall go unnamed, and the owner of the bookstore was there. And I just went up and introduced myself and asked, I said, "I just wanted to see if you had any of my books. I'm happy to sign them if you have any." And she said, "Well, can you name?" I said, "Well, one that probably most people know is it's called The Last Cuentista." She goes, "Oh, we don't carry those kinds of books here." And I said, "Oh, what do you mean?" And she's like, "Well, we don't carry Spanish language books." I'm like, "Oh, well, it's in English. Yes, there's some Spanish within it, but it's written in English."

And the experience got so strange because I said, "Okay." She kept saying, she goes, "I don't think you understand. We're not going to carry that kind of book here." And I just said, "Okay, well, I think I should go." And she goes, "Don't get me wrong. I've been to Mexico." And I'm like, "What? This is going in a really weird direction."

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:    
Wow. Yeah.

Donna Barba Higuera:
And so, I said, I think there are going to be booksellers like that who just don't want to read or understand outside of their own experience. And it's a shame because they're the curators and that means that anyone going into that store, a child who might have wanted to read something like that cannot. And that's her prerogative. It's her store. She can do what she wants. But I think it's a shame, and it's not just about my book, it's to be close minded to all books that might have a Mexican American background or Spanish background, it was a strange experience.

 But it was a good learning experience for me too, because I went in really optimistic in meeting somebody. And I live in the Pacific Northwest, and it was in my own neck of the woods, and it was a hard experience, but it was good for me to know that it happens everywhere. And we can think that we live in an area that they're going to have all kinds of books, not necessarily, you just never know.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:        
Yeah. I'm sorry to hear that happened to you, Donna. And I think you are right that sadly that does occur more than we'd like to believe or think that it does. And to me, it's such an interesting example of power hoarding to be able to gatekeep opportunities for other people to expand their worldview. Where does somebody get the idea that that is a right of theirs to have? I mean, but we see it. We are seeing it all over the place right now with all of the censorship happening in our schools and in our libraries, but it's going to be forever perplexing to me.

Pia Alliende:                        
Yeah. And I think in a lot of time it's like an assumption of what the actual, because probably that lady assumed, "Oh, it's in Spanish. We don't have Spanish speaker in this community. I'm not going to get that book." And not even knowing that it's in English, that it's kind like a science fiction book that is good story. And the fact that they are characters that they are Mexican American, I mean, is part of your way of making, also representing, and also because it's you.

I mean, without even reading the books or at least reading reviews or something that can largely ... I have a teacher in my school, in my district that one time when I got a lot of books about very diverse groups, and one of them was Muslim kids that in central Oregon. I don't think we had any Muslim even with the burka or no. She told me, "Thank you for getting those books because this is the only way that my kids can learn about different cultures," and not because the majority of the kids are, 75% of them are white, cannot have those books I mean represented. And also, because many occasions, they're misrepresented also or wrongly represented.

Donna Barba Higuera:
Yeah. There are parts of it. I look back and go, "Okay, well maybe at some point she'll be more open to bringing those books in." And maybe not, maybe not. Maybe there'll be people who don't change. But again, it just comes back to having the right curators and people who put those books in kids' hands so they can be readers and writers long into their life and know all different things about different parts of the world and different cultures.

Pia Alliende:                            
And also, it'll be, like you said before, feeling proud of, for example, your grandma instead of feeling ashamed of your grandma.

Donna Barba Higuera:      
Exactly. Life is about learning.

Pia Alliende:       
And also, if you see the, I mean, my big fight is about even writing materials in the schools or the mandatory reading, it's like, "Why we don't diversify those?" Use a poet from El Salvador instead of an American poet if you are going to show how to write certain way. I mean, so the kid that is in your class is like, "Okay, El Salvador is not all about sad immigrant story or somebody that I don't want to mention, but might say that we are all criminals or whatever." So, instead of that is there is a poet, a famous poet in my country, or is a famous architect or scientist or I don't know, highlight those.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:    
I feel like it pushes back against, well, obviously those stereotypes, but when we see, or at least for a long time, I feel like when we saw representation in books, it's all like trauma and these are these really terrible things that have happened and how people have overcome them or maybe not overcome them, but it doesn't really open up the opportunity to see that other cultures that are different than our own, they have beauty, they have things they celebrate, they have families. They have so many things that are both in common with what we know, but opportunities for us to learn so much more and it makes us all better when we're exposed to people.

Pia Alliende:                      
I agree.

Donna Barba Higuera:
Yeah. I can say that I was well traveled before and I've done so much traveling in the last few years, and the biggest thing that I have learned that there's way, way, way more that connects us in the world then separates us as people and friendships and love. It's so important if we just slow down a minute and listen to one another.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:       
Absolutely. Well, I have one last question for you, Donna. And this is tied to an opportunity that is happening next month. So, as you already know, Pia and I were honored to be invited to speak on behalf of our committee, the Equity Diversity Inclusion, and Anti-Racism Committee for the Oregon Library Association. And specifically, about this podcast, OVERDUE at ALSC, the Association for Library Services to Children's Institute next month. This year's theme for the ALSC Institute is standing up for stories. What does standing up for stories look like to you?

Donna Barba Higuera:         
Oh, boy. This is hard question. For me, standing up for stories, I look at it just from my personal experience. And for me, it's just continuing to write what I write and hoping that my books will make it into kids' hands. And I know that I've had books that are challenged for no other reason other than they're different from someone else's experience.

And so, standing up for my culture and my culture stories, which I have multiple cultures that I want to write from, and that's what it feels like for me. And I know that standing up for stories can mean so many different things for different people. It can be speaking at a local school board. And there are people who are just really vocal advocates. And I feel we have every person has to find what their strength is and where their strength is in standing up for stories. And for me, it's just going to be through continuing to write them.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:    
That's lovely. I can say with certainty that I will continue standing up for your stories, Donna. I will stand up for everyone's stories, especially the ones that I feel have been pushed back to the back or have been silenced. I will stand taller, I will speak louder and make sure that everybody's story has a chance to heard.

Donna Barba Higuera:       
Well, I will stand with you, but I'll probably get right behind you a little, because I'm a big scaredy cat. I'll stand right behind you and then I'll just go, "Yeah, what she said."

Pia Alliende:                         
But I really like your explanation of everyone has a different way of standing up for stories. It's not like we have to be all writers or we have to be all ... I mean, each person has a different way of standing up for stories and disrupt some stories.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:         
Well, thank you so much for joining us today, Donna, and thank you for sharing your time with us on the podcast and of course sharing your stories with all of us as well.

Donna Barba Higuera:  
 Oh, thank you so much for inviting me and having me. This was wonderful.

(Post-Interview Reflection) - Recorded October 16, 2024

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:      
Well, thank you for joining me again, Pia. I feel like I've enjoyed all of our conversations together. This one that we just had with Donna. And then of course during this conversation as we were recording with Donna, we had that idea to maybe take this to ASLC, the Association of Library Services for Children's National Institute in Denver and do it live, which was a phenomenal experience to go through that with you and having Donna Barba Higuera there live with us.

Pia Alliende:                            
Yeah. No, actually that was very, I mean, for me it was a very exciting experience. I mean, because we went to ASLC in September 18, I guess we arrived there and we left the 22nd. I was very excited to be the three of us together. So, having this conversation, previous conversation with Donna that we pre-recorded, we thought there was going to be the rehearsal.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:       
Yeah, "best laid plans" as they say.

Pia Alliende:                    
Yeah. I mean, maybe you can explain what happened at ALSC, and I can pitch in a little bit, but I think both experience for me were very powerful, especially, I mean with the idea of the theme of the National Institute that was the standing up for standing for stories.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:    
Yeah. It fit in so perfectly, which is, so for our listeners out there, as we were recording this interview with Donna, we had this great, great bright idea to do this live. So, we talked a little bit in this conversation about how we were attending the ALSC conference in a few weeks. And with that theme of standing up for stories, we got so inspired in this conversation that we thought we would just do this live. So, this was going to be a great dress rehearsal, practice for what would happen on stage.

And we were so thankful and grateful that everything fell in place, and we were able to have that conversation live for ALSC attendees and to be recorded, to be shared out later. But unfortunately, as some things happen, the recording got compromised. There was a lot of feedback and we weren't able to salvage it.

 So, we were lucky enough that we did have this conversation we had already recorded with Donna and a lot of the same themes of what does it look like to stand up for stories? We're present in both conversations. What does it look like to stand up for diversity in stories, for representation in stories? And Pia and I had also the opportunity to talk a little bit about what that looks like in podcasting, why we started this podcast, and what it looks like to be able to amplify people's stories and the importance of having diverse perspective and diverse stories shared with folks at a larger scale.

Pia Alliende:                        
And one thing that people are not going to, I mean in a podcast cannot see, but it's going to be in the kind of like a link, we wanted not just be, even though we gave flowers to each other. I mean, in Spanish you say throw flowers to people is when you give them compliments. I mean, because I think that Donna and Ericka are awesome people.

The idea was we were like, how can we, not just that is a podcast about us or Donna, Ericka and Pia, but that we show a little bit of all the people that has been recorded and that have been participated as a host or as a guest in OVERDUE. So, while we were talking, they were projected all the people that have been in the podcast. And I think even though we couldn't see it because it was behind us, I think that that make a little bit of the atmosphere also more impactful with the idea that all the guests and all the hosts were with us in that big room with around 300 people.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:
Yeah, absolutely. And I had folks come up and say that they saw people on the screen that played an important part in their life, or somebody that they had read an article by, and they were really inspired in this work. So, seeing that we had an episode recorded with them, they were able to scan the QR code and go back to the podcast and listen to those episodes. And we can see that reflected in the numbers of downloads and listens that we've gotten since that conference.

So, overall, it was an amazing long weekend standing up for stories. It was an amazing long weekend connecting with folks that are doing this work and really wanting to amplify those voices alongside us. So, thank you so much, Pia, for joining me in this conversation and the conversation on stage in Denver and just in this work together. I've just valued so much our professional relationship, but also our personal friendship.

Pia Alliende:                         
Yes. No, thank you for inviting me, Ericka, and the entire committee, because this was very impactful experience for me. And also, I think that the audience, I mean, they were in tears when Donna read Ms. Hughes. I don't know if I'm pronouncing it correct. Maybe you correct me.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:
Yeah. It was Ms. Hughes. Yeah, you got it.

Pia Alliende:                                
Yeah. Her librarian when she was growing up, because a lot of people afterwards they say that they were almost in tears when they heard that. And I wish, I don't know, maybe Donna can send us that the letter and we can post it also, because that was also super, was very nice. I mean, the idea of amplifying the work of all the librarians that are doing the work for getting voices heard and standing up for them, for those voices.

Ericka Brunson-Rochette:  
Absolutely. It was a really impactful and beautiful way to just wrap everything together. And for our listeners of this episode, you might remember Ms. Hughes is the one that had the talking soup can. It's hard to forget the talking soup can. Well, thank you so much and until next time, Pia.

Pia Alliende:                     
All right. Yes. Looking forward for more episodes.

(Voiceover)
This project was made possible in part by the Institute of Museum and Library Services through the Library Services and Technology Act, administered by the State Library of Oregon. [foreign language 01:09:46].

(Voiceover)
We would like to take time to acknowledge historical injustices. We recognize Oregon was established as a white sanctuary state with the intent to exclude African American and Black people on ancestral lands stolen from dispossessed indigenous peoples. We recognize and honor the members of federally recognized tribes and unrecognized tribes of Oregon. We honor Native American ancestors, past, present, and future whose land we still occupy.

This acknowledgement aims to deconstruct false histories, correct the historical record and disrupt genocidal practices by refocusing attention to the original people of the land we inhabit the slave trade and forced labor that built this country, and to the oppressive social systems interwoven into the fabric of our national and regional heritage. We ask that you take a moment to acknowledge and reflect as well.

(Outro Music Playing)