Past Events

For recordings of past events, see our mediaspace channel.

Fall 2024

September 24: Religion and Culture in Youth Literature Publisher Roundtables (Recording available here).

October 21: Gryphon Lecture – Anastasia Ulanowicz: “Rethinking the Influence of Religion and Religious Identity in Contemporary US Children’s Literature.” (Recording available here).

November 4: Isabel Lopes Coelho: “Where the Wild Things Are: North America’s Cultural Influence Over the Brazilian Editorial Market.” (Recording available here).

Spring 2024

March 4: Data Mining, Digital Humanities and Children’s Literature (Recording available here).

March 21: Gryphon Lecture – Katharine Capshaw: “Grappling with Martin Luther King Jr. in Youth Literature: Sequence as Resistance”(Recording available here.) (Transcript.)

Fall 2023

September 14: Christopher Paul Curtis’ Morning Address from 16th St. Baptist Church Livestream Watch party. (Recording available here.)

December 4Writing and Illustrating Civil Rights Childhoods: Author-Artist Panel (Recording and transcript available here— requires UIUC  authentication)

Spring 2023

February 13: Emerging Scholars Panel: Asian American Youth Literature (Transcript available here.) (Zoom recording available here.

March 7: Roundtable: The History of Changing U.S. History Instruction (Transcript available here.) (Zoom recording available here.)

March 20: 2023 Gryphon Lecture  Sohyun An: “Implementing the TEAACH Act: Using Asian American Children’s Literature as a Tool to Resist America’s Long History of Anti-Asian Violence” (Transcript available here.) (Zoom recording available here.

Fall 2022

September 27: A Book Club with Ms. Edith Campbell and Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen (ABCCD) – Impossible Moon by Breanna McDaniel and Tonya Engel, and A Big Mooncake for Little Star by Grace Lin.

September 28“How Youth Literature Can Support the Teaching of Asian American Community History” with authors Adib Khorram, Andrea Wang, Minh Lê, and Rajani LaRocca.  (Transcript available here.) (Zoom recording available here.)

October 25: A Book Club with Ms. Edith Campbell and Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen (ABCCD) – The Silence that Binds Us by Joanna Ho.

November 1: A Conversation Between Award-Winning Writer Christina Soontornvat and Professor Sarah Park Dahlen (Transcript available here.(Zoom recording available here.)

November 3: The Bulletin Brown Bag: The Art of Reviewing Youth Literature (Transcript available here). (Zoom recording available here.)

November 10: The Bulletin Brown Bag: A Discussion with Sensitivity Readers (Transcript available here.) (Zoom recording available here.)

November 17: The Bulletin Brown Bag: Librarians and Collection Development (Transcript available here.) (Zoom recording here.)

November 29: A Book Club with Ms. Edith Campbell and Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen (ABCCD) – The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks by Jeanne Theoharis.

Spring 2022

February 11: Leanne Bowler, Pratt Institute, “After-School Data Literacy Programs for Youth at the Public Library”  (*Note – To view this recording on Mediaspace, you must log in with a UIUC Net-ID and password)

February 23: A Book Club with Ms. Edith Campbell and Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen (ABCCD) – The 1619 Project: Born on the Water

March 2: Sensitivity Reading Panel 

March 30: A Book Club with Ms. Edith Campbell and Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen (ABCCD) – Maizy Chen’s Last Chance by Lisa Yee. With special guest, Lisa Yee. 

April 8:  “Picturing Young, Gifted, and Black: Phillis Wheatley’s Image and the Creative Black Child.” Brigitte Fielder, University of Wisconsin–Madison.

April 11: Panel – Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Youth Literature: APALA’s Evaluation Rubric. – More Information

April 20: A Book Club with Ms. Edith Campbell and Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen (ABCCD) – Star Child: A Biographical Constellation of Octavia Estelle Butler by Ibi Zobio. With special guest, Ibi Zobio

May 18: A Book Club with Ms. Edith Campbell and Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen (ABCCD) – Troublemaker by John Cho. With special guest, Alvina Ling.

June 15: A Book Club with Ms. Edith Campbell and Dr. Sarah Park Dahlen: Moonwalking by Zetta Elliot and Lyn Miller-Lachmann. With special guests, Zetta Elliot and Lyn Miller-Lachmann.

Spring 2021

January 28: Angel Matos, Bowdoin College, “Queer Young Adult Novels that Sadden and Hurt: Adam Silvera’s Oeuvre and the Politics of Unhappiness”

February 18: Lynne McKechnie, University of Western Ontario, “‘I Readed It’ (Marissa, Four Years): What the Research and the Children Themselves Tell Us About the Experience of Reading”

March 11: The Data-Sitters Club, “Tropes and Tribulations: Exploring Computational Text-Analysis with the Data-Sitters Club”  – The Data-Sitters Club Lecture Transcript

April 15: 2021 Gryphon Lecture – Matthew Grenby, “Going Global: Transnational Networks and the Spread of Early Modern Children’s Books” – 2021 Gryphon Lecture Transcript  (To view this transcript, you must log in with a UIUC Net-ID and password) 

Fall 2020

September 17: Matthew Rubery, Queen Mary University of London, “Book Audio”

October 8: Victoria Ford Smith, University of Connecticut, “A Nasty, Biting Thing: The Wayward Child as Collaborator”

November 12: Sarah Park Dahlen, St. Catherine University, “(Re)Presenting Korea: The Carpenters and the White American Imaginary”