November 2020 Youth and Family Programming
November 2020 Teen Programming
November 2020 Adult Programming
EXHIBITS
To submit a public program or exhibition proposal, click here.
Journaling Journey Series: Coping Through the Fear of the Unknown
Journaling through the Heaviness
Today we walk through a journaling activity to help ground us in the valley of heaviness. It ebbs and flows and yet, your own words and images are here to guide you back, get centered and remember.
Date: Every Friday through December 2020
Start date: Friday, November 6th
Time: 10:00 AM
Virtual: Faceboook
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Revisiting Thanksgiving,
and the Green Corn Festival Celebration
Many Americans celebrate Thanksgiving as a peaceful breaking of bread between Native people and European settlers, but what really happened? And what are the Indigenous origins of Thanksgiving pre-colonization? Hear Indigenous perspectives on Thanksgiving, and learn about historically practiced and current day Indigenous harvest celebrations, including the Green Corn Festival.
Featuring panelists Natasha Gambrell of the Eastern Pequot Tribal Nation, Yvonne Matthews of the Cree Tribe, Melissa Wesaw of the Schaghticoke Tribal Nation, Sage Philips of the Penobscot Nation, Rachel Massaro of Nansemond tribe, and moderator Patricia Kelly. Also featuring a presentation on Indigenous food traditions by UCONN’s “Planting Our Roots Initiative,” and performances from Carl Hardrick and Cynthia Paniagua.
Date: Monday, November 23rd
Time: 6:00 pm – 7:15 pm
Virtual: Via Faceboook LIVE
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Freedom From Smoking 2020
Join us for a FREE program for those ready to quit smoking. Group meets Thursday evenings for 7 weeks, including Monday, November 2nd.
Requirements to participate:
• Ready to quit
• Must be available for 8 sessions
• Must be able to access documents electronically
• Must be able to connect virtually for weekly meetings
DATES: October 8 — November 19
TIME: 5:30 — 7 p.m.
LOCATION: Webex link to follow after registration
TO SIGN UP: Call 860.679.4007. Space is limited.
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Book Clubs
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"Reading material for the homies."
Hartford Public Library is a chapter of Noname's Book Club, an online/irl community dedicated to uplifting POC voices. They do this by highlighting two books each month written by authors of color. From cult classics to the words of emergent authors, Noname’s Book Club highlights books that speak on human conditions in critical and original ways. In addition to social media presence have free virtual meet ups to discuss the monthly picks in a safe and supportive environment. Click here for more information on Noname's Book Club.
*If you have incarcerated friends/family who would be interested in reading along with us email their information to info@nonamebooks.com and they will send them the books.
Join Noname's Digital Nationwide Monthly Meet Up
Next Zoom session will be at the end of November 2020, date TBD— check back in for more event registration details
Noname's November Pick:
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.jpeg) Our History Is The Future by Nick Estes
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In 2016, a small protest encampment at the Standing Rock reservation in North Dakota, initially established to block construction of the Dakota Access oil pipeline, grew to be the largest Indigenous protest movement in the twenty-first century, attracting tens of thousands of Indigenous and non-Native allies from around the world. Its slogan "Mni Wiconi" Water is Life was about more than just a pipeline. Water Protectors knew this battle for Native sovereignty had already been fought many times before, and that, even after the encampment was gone, their anti-colonial struggle would continue. In Our History is the Future, Nick Estes traces traditions of Indigenous resistance leading to the #NoDAPL movement from the days of the Missouri River trading forts through the Indian Wars, the Pick-Sloan dams, the American Indian Movement, and the campaign for Indigenous rights at the United Nations. While a historian by trade, Estes also draws on observations from the encampments and from growing up as a citizen of the Oceti Sakowin (the Nation of the Seven Council Fires), making Our History is the Future at once a work of history, a personal story, and a manifesto.
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November Session Meet:
Date TBD: Via Zoom
For a list of all of Noname's book picks, click here.
Hartord Reads in Color
Hartford Reads in Color is a book club committed to delving into the narratives and rich diverse voices of communities of color. From the intellectually astute, to the uncouth and wretched, we are reading with no limits. Focused on shedding light on literature across the diaspora while also educating the community of the various authors and stories that sound and look like them.
This group meets every last Sunday of the month. Registration is required. Seating is limited. To register, click here
November Pick:
 Lovecraft Country By Matt Ruff
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The critically acclaimed cult novelist makes visceral the terrors of life in Jim Crow America and its lingering effects in this brilliant and wondrous work of the imagination that melds historical fiction, pulp noir, and Lovecraftian horror and fantasy.Chicago, 1954. When his father Montrose goes missing, 22-year-old Army veteran Atticus Turner embarks on a road trip to New England to find him, accompanied by his Uncle George—publisher of The Safe Negro Travel Guide—and his childhood friend Letitia. On their journey to the manor of Mr. Braithwhite—heir to the estate that owned one of Atticus's ancestors—they encounter both mundane terrors of white America and malevolent spirits that seem straight out of the weird tales George devours.At the manor, Atticus discovers his father in chains, held prisoner by a secret cabal named the Order of the Ancient Dawn—led by Samuel Braithwhite and his son Caleb—which has gathered to orchestrate a ritual that shockingly centers on Atticus. And his one hope of salvation may be the seed of his—and the whole Turner clan's—destruction.A chimerical blend of magic, power, hope, and freedom that stretches across time, touching diverse members of two black families, Lovecraft Country is a devastating kaleidoscopic portrait of racism—the terrifying specter that continues to haunt us today.
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November Session Meets:
November 29th, 2020
4:30-5:45 pm via zoom
Zoom instruction sent following registration
The Awakening Book Club
We understand the need for a safe and open space for young adults, ages 13-25, to connect around a good book. Join us for a much needed conversation about past and present racial injustices through a discussion of Alexander's book, The New Jim Crow. Not an avid reader? Come and hear what others have to say about this important dialogue. This series consists of biweekly discussions of a book of the month, which addresses and actively fights systemic racism on topics such as medical negligence towards Black people and mass incarceration.
Please register for the book club so we can save you a seat!
November Pick:
 The New Jim Crow By Michelle Alexander
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Seldom does a book have the impact of Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow. Since it was first published in 2010, it has been cited in judicial decisions and has been adopted in campus-wide and community-wide reads; it has been the winner of numerous prizes, including the NAACP Image Award; and it has spent nearly 250 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. Most important of all, it has spawned a whole generation of criminal justice reform activists motivated by Michelle Alexander's unforgettable argument that 'we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it.'
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November Session Meets:
Session 1: November 12th
Session 2: November 27th
6pm via zoom
Zoom instruction sent following registration
Deep Appreciation Book Club
Hartford Public Library and Hartford Stage invite the community to a new book club, called “Deep Appreciation,” a heart-led gathering featuring live readings, interactive dialogue and reflections on fiction and poetry by Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) authors, past and present. The book club will meet quarterly to discuss the selection with teens and adults, as well as provide a family friendly book pairing for those who wish to continue the conversation at home. Everyone is welcome. To regiser, visit: http://bit.ly/DeepAppreciation
November Pick:
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 Red To The Bone: by Jaqueline Woodson
Moving forward and backward in time, Jacqueline Woodson's taut and powerful new novel uncovers the role that history and community have played in the experiences, decisions, and relationships of these families, and in the life of the new child. As the book opens in 2001, it is the evening of sixteen-year-old Melody's coming of age ceremony in her grandparents' Brooklyn brownstone. Watched lovingly by her relatives and friends, making her entrance to the music of Prince, she wears a special custom-made dress. But the event is not without poignancy. Sixteen years earlier, that very dress was measured and sewn for a different wearer: Melody's mother, for her own ceremony— a celebration that ultimately never took place. Unfurling the history of Melody's parents and grandparents to show how they all arrived at this moment, Woodson considers not just their ambitions and successes but also the costs, the tolls they've paid for striving to overcome expectations and escape the pull of history. As it explores sexual desire and identity, ambition, gentrification, education, class and status, and the life-altering facts of parenthood.
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 I Am Enough: by
Grace Byers
Byers shares a story of loving who you are, respecting others and being kind to one another. I Am Enough by Grace Byers offers constructive affirmations for those who lack self-esteem and self-acceptance. It celebrates children for who they are and promotes positive female role models. I am Enough promotes the message that we are unique and that will always be enough. A young girl makes positive declarations – “Like the sun I am here to shine… like the bird I am here to fly and soar high over everything.” She is surrounded by friends of different colours and cultures and declares “I’m not meant to be like you; you’re not meant to be like me. Sometimes we will get along, and sometimes we will disagree.” A book to promote a positive self-image and self-acceptance that we are worthy no matter our skin color, race, religion, disability and interests.
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November Session Meet:
November 19th, 7:00-8:30pm Via Zoom
African American Literature Book Club
The AAL Book Club is for anyone interested in reading and discussing African American literature, both fiction and nonfiction, as well as sharing information and learning about the African American experience. It is an opportunity for us to get to know each other while we engage in lively and stimulating discussion of topics of interest to us all.
October Pick:
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 Citizen: by Claudia Rankine
Claudia Rankine's bold new book recounts mounting racial aggressions in ongoing encounters in twenty-first-century daily life and in the media. Some of these encounters are slights, seeming slips of the tongue, and some are intentional offensives in the classroom, at the supermarket, at home, on the tennis court with Serena Williams and the soccer field with Zinedine Zidane, online, on TV-everywhere, all the time. The accumulative stresses come to bear on a person's ability to speak, perform, and stay alive. Our addressability is tied to the state of our belonging, Rankine argues, as are our assumptions and expectations of citizenship.
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October Session Meet:
October 27th, 7:00PM Via Zoom
Please RSVP to Carolyn Korber at cjkorber@gmail.com
Browse our past online programs and click the links to watch videos!
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To browse our past virtual Art Inside programs, click here
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To browse our past virtual Reads From the Hart programs, click here
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To browse our past virtual Wellness Wednesdays programs, click here
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To browse our past virtual Home Hacks programs, click here
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To browse our past virtual Friday Jams programs, click here
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To browse our past virtual local business spotlight programs, click here
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ART WALK
ArtWalk at Hartford Public Library offers one of the largest and most stunning exhibition spaces in greater Hartford and the opportunity for Hartford residents and others to view art in a magnificent setting in our city.
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Lost in Color
Erik Williams, Black Frame Vision
UPDATE: Exhibit runs through July 6, 2020
ArtWalk, Downtown Library
Watch Virtual Exhibit HERE
Virtual Artist Talk on @HPLCT Instagram Live:
Watch Recorded Interview HERE
Erik Williams is a street photographer and also the owner of Black Frame Vision, a street photography brand based in Connecticut. He fell in love with this style of photography because of its rawness and the opportunity it creates to capture honest moments. It allows him to connect with people from all walks and to share their stories candidly through the lens of his camera.
"I use my photography to catch a glimpse of what I see, in order to share it with others. I look for the beauty in any and everything that most overlook.
My choice of subject is anything organically appealing to my eye, whether it's a kid sleeping on the city bus or a reflection of a building from a puddle. I enjoy using natural light, shadows, contrast and clarity as a way to communicate the essence of what I see. I'm drawn to people that radiate energy and great character, because that's all that truly matters. I am inspired by their stories."
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Hartford Women: Leading the Way
Online exhibit available HERE!
Actresses, award-winners, broadcasters, business women, politicians, soldiers, students, and truck drivers; all Hartford women who broke barriers and paved the way for other women.
In celebration of Women’s History Month this March, enjoy a selection of photographs of extraordinary Hartford women from the Hartford Times collection housed in the Hartford History Center at Hartford Public Library.
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Ella Brown, Hartford Times photograph by Morton J. Boardman
January 23, 1962
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New Banner at Downtown Library
A banner was recently installed on the northwest corner of Hartford Public Library, 500 Main Street. The banner depicts various library activities.
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When Ramiro Louisa returned to Hartford from the Netherlands, one of the first place he brought his daughter, Delyani, was the Hartford Public Library’s Children’s Department.
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On Wednesday, May 15, Connecticut Ballet came to Hartford Public Library to present a free preview of “Old, New, Borrowed and Blue, an incredibly beautiful show it performed later in the week at The Bushnell. Shown here are Connecticut Ballet dancers are Stephen Diaz and Claire Mazza, performing ‘In The Shadow of Women’ by Marden Ramos.
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Each library in the HPL system tailors its programming to reflect the population it serves. The Downtown Library’s Children’s Department is very popular with Indian-Americans who live in the surrounding area. Each year, the department celebrates both Diwali in the fall and Holi in the spring. Yogitha Sarjay is shown making a decoration for Diwali, also known as the Festival of Lights.
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Phone: (860) 695-6300
