Archive for September, 2012
OffWorld:The WordSpace Science Fiction Book Club
What: OffWorld: The WordSpace Science Fiction Book Club
Where: WordSpace, 415 North Tyler St.
When: Monthly, beginning Wednesday October 17, 7 pm
Admission: FREE
Hosted by: Phllip Washington
The Author: Neal Stephenson
An invitation from WordSpace to step OffWorld:
The WordSpace Science Fiction Book Club
If you are a science fiction fan, please read Section A below. If you are not currently a science fiction reader, please skip to Section B.
SECTION A
“Does your bucket list include things like “piercing the outer layers of corporate cyberstructures, surfing the burning neon matrix of the cosmic internet, picturesque holograms of your disembodied consciousness navigating 4 dimensional super-continuums?”
Do you have dreams of futuristic landscapes, cybernetic samurais, and psychic aliens? Have you ever wanted to travel through time?” “Do you see yourself living in future dystopias and utopias? We hear you loud and clear, You’re saying: “Yes As long as it ain’t as hot THERE as summer in Dallas.” We’d have to agree with you on that one.
Answering “Yes” to most of these questions indicates a functioning imagination. And guess what? We have a place for you, and others like you. Join “OffWorld: The Official Dallas Science Fiction Book Club” today. Get ready to geek out, PhReAk out, and congregate with other kindred spirits who love Science Fiction literature.
(Please proceed to Section C, or read Section B just for the fun of it.)
SECTION B
Did you stop reading science fiction when you were fourteen years old? Is “1984″ the only science fiction novel you ever read, and then only because it was assigned in class? Do you assume all science fiction novels are either based on Star Trek or cater to adolescent, male sexual fantasies?
Well, there is a whole new alien landscape out there, and WordSpace wants to explore it with you.
The current crop of science fiction writers are complex, funny, visionary, and scary-smart on topics most people will know little or nothing about before they change our world forever.
OffWorld: The Official Dallas Science Fiction Book Club will introduce you to a new perspective of the present by examining visions of the future
(Please proceed to Section C)
SECTION C
Joining is easy and fun. Here is how OffWorld works:
1) Rather than reading a particular book, OffWorld will choose a writer to focus on for a three-month period.
2) Club members may read one or several books by that author during the three months.
3) The website Worlds Without End has generously offered to host discussion forums for OffWorld. The forums will feature ongoing discussions of individual books and general topics related to the author. Members can propose their own forum topics.
4) During the three-month session, WordSpace will host two discussions on the author and his or her work at our Tyler Street storefront in Oak Cliff.
5) During the three-month session, Half Price Books on Northwest Highway will also host a public meeting, this one with a guest speaker from the scientific, medical, or tech community who will discuss a topic —anything from robotics to advances in molecular biology, as it relates to science fiction.
6) Joining OffWorld is FREE. The sessions at Half Price Books will cost $10, but will be free to WordSpace members.
Neal Stephenson is our first OffWorld author. (Warning! Warning! Some of Mr. Stephenson’s books are 1000 pages long, but hey, you have three months to read one, and some are much shorter.)
To join OffWorld or for more information contact Phillip Washington at offworld@wordspace.us or call WordSpace, 214-838-3554, ext. 2.
Dagoberto Gilb with Felix Flores Band
What: Dagoberto Gilb with special music guest, Felix Flores Band
Hosted by: Dallas CM Delia Jasso and Celia Alvarez Muñoz
When: Thursday, February 28, 8 pm
Where: Bishop Arts Theater, 215 South Tyler St.
Admission: $20 Gen Admin, $30 Reserved, $50 VIP Meet/Greet
MEMBERS DISCOUNTS: from $15
Read Dagoberto Gilb in the February Issue of Texas Monthly.
Dagoberto Gilb is an American writer born in Los Angeles, California, whose reputation, after years between L.A. and Texas, is as one of the leading voices from the American Southwest. His many works include Woodcuts of Women, 2001, Gritos, 2003, Hecho en Tejas: An Anthology of Texas Mexican Literature, 2006, The Flowers, 2008, Before the End, After the Beginning, 2011,
His many many awards include James D. Phelan Award, San Francisco Foundation, 1984, Dobie-Paisano Fellowship, Texas Institute of Letters, 1987, National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, 1992Whiting Writers’ Award, 1993PEN/Hemingway Award, 1994, PEN Faulkner Award, finalist, 1994, El Paso Writers’ Hall of Fame, 1995, Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, 1995, National Book Critics Circle Award, finalist, 2003, Texas Book Festival Bookend Award, 2007, PEN Southwest Book Award, 2008.
Dagoberto Gilb’s work has been translated into French, Italian, Japanese, German, Spanish, and Dutch. Anthologized in many literary and college composition textbooks. He is featured in the February issue of Texas Monthly.
WordSpace is also please to present the popular hot up and coming music group Felix Flores Band to warm you up for Dagoberto.
Felix Flores Band is a Dallas based band whose music is a fusion of folk, jazz, flamenco and rock. Formed in 2005, this band has been active in the local scene for years and regularly plays coffeehouses, bars, art openings, festivals and special events.
“Felix conveys with aching accuracy the perils of love gone awry as well as poetically penetrating into the depths of the soul with his words. As for the uniquely talented characters that back him, Felix Flores Band specializes in sway in your seat, hold your honey tight- make love melodies. This is a jam band for the soul.” -Amberly Russell, poet
Felix Flores Band draws inspiration from a wide variety of sources stretching from musicians such as Ani DiFranco, Jeff Buckley, Beth Orton, PJ Harvey, Bright Eyes, Jack White, Miles Davis, Gypsy Kings -to writers Paolo Coelho and Kahlil Gibran.
“Love is like water
You can jump in it you can feel it
It can trickle down like rain
Or flood you like a hurricane”
– Lyrics from Love is like Water by Felix Flores
Felix Flores – Vocals, Guitar, Lap Steel, Mandolin
Mingo Flores – Drums, Percussion
James Sands – Lead Guitar, Bass
Ely Sellers – Bass
Our Hosts:
Dallas City Council Member Delia Jasso represents District 1, Oak Cliff, and is very active in advocating on behalf of arts, education and redevelopment of this historic Dallas neighorhood. She was served as CM since 2009 and has served as community and civics leader for over 20 years.
Celia Alvarez Muñoz was born in El Paso in 1937, and grew up amid competing cultures, languages, and value systems along the U.S.-Mexico border. She is an internationally recognized artist with countless exhibitions, public commissions and awards. Her image-text art explores the first glances and misread signs that occur where cultures meet, and the stories that they tell about the history of American society, culture, and modern art.
