By Joan Paulette Dudley
Write in the ink of the grandmothers: ash from a cold hearth,
tears that fall for no reason, and blood from a needle-pricked finger.
List your fears on a paper bag, pulled from under the sink.
By DeAnna Beachley
she emerges
sloughing bark and leaves
as snakes shed their skin
abandon the old
for the new
By Aimee Nezhukumatathil
Pilea plants can make even the blackest thumbs look positively green. Not just green, but lime, forest, Kelly, viridian, jade, jungle, shamrock, chartreuse, and even honeydew. At a time of so much stillness and uncertainty, the pilea gave me so much promise.
By Ellen Hopkins
I’m currently at a writing retreat, one I’ve done before, but not in a while. Climbing out of the COVID shell and emerging into the familiar. Sort of. I’ve spent the last week preparing for a move, our first in over 30 years. The bio I’ve used for at least a decade says I live with my extended family, and this pivotal moment in my history means uprooting them, too. We will go in different directions, and wind up 2,000 miles apart.
By Abbey L. Pike
Two hundred and thirty-four years ago to the day, the framers signed the Constitution of the United States. Arguably, the Constitution remains the greatest instrument for fair governance ever produced, promising human liberty and dignity to an extent that no country before had ever dared. The framers intended the Constitution to thrive as a lasting document, so they designed a solid basis for governance and individual liberty but wove in avenues for social and governmental change.
By Afsha Bawany
I threw away my Girl Scout badges. I kept them for oh so long that in my decluttering extravaganza, I thought these were items I would have to let go. I wasn’t in Girl Scouts for long. I did not earn a sash. I could let go of my Girl Scout badges, I reasoned, because I did not end up learning how to pitch a tent after all these years. I had not camped under the stars. I did not go backpacking.
By Natalie Van Hoozer
Right now, many people across the nation feel divided. As the bilingual Spanish/English reporter for KUNR Public Radio, I do see division first hand, right here in northern Nevada, where I was born and raised. At the same time, I’ve had community members tell me they want to understand each other better.
Where does one’s literacy journey begin? From birth through childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and beyond, the need for literacy dominates the way we move through the world and understand it. One way we can think of literacy is to think of it as the ability or capacity to communicate and interact with others and to make sense of the world around us. Literacy can also come in many different forms: musical, culinary, financial, digital, and more.
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By Kathleen Kuo
I close my eyes, and I hear the ocean. The whispers of wind filtering through leaves of grass, small flies buzzing next to my ears and zipping in and out, the round notes of a bird call. I am peacefully laying in the middle of a mountain meadow on a hot summer day and losing myself in meditative listening. After being cooped up at home for more than a year, Nevada has never sounded more beautiful than in this moment.
By Daria Peoples
Like many children of color, I experienced racism and biases at school. Back then, I didn’t know the words to describe how I was treated, but I do remember feeling as though my classmates and my teachers liked one another more than they liked me. As a visiting author in many schools across the country, I often see versions of myself sitting in desks and walking down hallways.
By Mark Padoongpatt
Las Vegas is a real place with real people. A laughable claim to most, I know. But writers, scholars, and locals can attest. Despite Vegas’ status and identity as one of the world’s top tourist destinations—an unbridled playground of gambling, shows, consumerism, and debauchery—its residents engage and experience the city in profoundly different ways. And the question of when, how, and why 2.6 million people came to build lives and communities here—real and imagined, fleeting and enduring—is all incredibly fascinating to me.
By Jagada Chambers
During the 80th legislative session in Nevada, state legislators made good on a quest that dates back decades. Efforts to change the reality for Nevada’s disenfranchised voters succeeded with the passing of Assembly Bill 431. The bill enabled all formerly incarcerated individuals to partake in our election process by casting a vote. The legislation changed the course of my life immediately, leading to a Rights Restoration Coordinator position with Silver State Voices and substantiation in my belief that voting can change things.
By Staff of Nevada Humanities
Nevada Humanities is pleased to announce the opening of the Nevada Humanities Major Project Grants that are part of the FY2022 Nevada Humanities Project Grants to Support Public Humanities Projects. These Major Project Grants, which fund projects and organizations across the state, have a public humanities project focus and will support public humanities projects that range from one month to one year to implement.
By Caitlin C. Earley
I spend a lot of time in the past. Between my research on ancient American Indigenous art and teaching art history classes at the University of Nevada, Reno, (UNR), my head is anywhere from 3000 BCE to the present. My students are sometimes reluctant to meet me there. I find this is particularly true when it comes to the art history survey. You may know this particular animal: a survey of art from the past to the present, often divided into two semesters.
By Caesar Andrews
Ever since the American rendition of Antiques Roadshow debuted on PBS in 1997, proud possessors of old furniture, art, jewelry, and quirky collectibles have queued up to present their wares to appraisers. Some owners discover that their belongings, believed to be exquisite treasures, actually are not worth much. Others hit the appraisal lottery, lighting up with glee when estimates of their artifacts match or exceed expectations. During the current national period of civic, cultural, and political restlessness, this long-running TV staple is an instructive point of reference for assessing the state of democracy.
By Anh Nguyen Gray
My mother would be in her early 70s now if she were still alive. But, instead, she died five years ago. It's a bit painful when I see older Asian women the age she would be today. They remind me of her; more so, they remind me of her absence. There's rarely a day that goes by that I don't think about my mother. Lately, I think of her more than usual, but the twinge of pain is different. Stories about violence against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) have made me more reflective about my family.
By Staff of Nevada Humanities
The Online Nevada Encyclopedia (ONE) is a free and easy-to-use multimedia educational resource that enables anyone, anywhere with online access to learn more about our Silver State. The ONE is widely used by Nevada educators in K‐12 classrooms and parents to bring Nevada’s history and culture to young people, as well as by the general public. ONE's scholarly, peer-reviewed articles have something of interest for all age groups, making it a convenient, online resource to supplement your homeschooling needs or dig deeper into all things Nevada.
By Harrison Blackman
Paul Revere Williams (1894–1980) may have been one of the most prolific architects in 20th century Los Angeles, but as the story goes, he often found the need to make his prospective clients more comfortable. So that his clients might sit across from him at his desk, the architect learned to sketch upside down.
By Dr. Elwood Schmidt
Each evening as I sit at the kitchen table my view is of the Virginia Range. For 26 years I have watched the light and shadows on the ridges and gullies of the Virginias sharpen, soften, then fade into darkness and change with the seasons.
By Kimberly Roberts
Every photograph is a contradiction: while photography captures an exact moment in time, that moment is always subject to interpretation. Images are neither static nor frozen, but constantly shifting, always dependent on context, difficult to pin down. One way to break through this is to distinguish between two ways of approaching the photograph: to try to reconstruct a photograph in history, to try to unlock its original intent; and to try to understand it through history, to analyze its changing contexts over time.