Merry Christmas!

Family Cartoon by Andertoons

Today is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day!

Frequently Asked Questions about Martin Luther King, Jr.

Question: When was Martin Luther King, Jr. born?

Answer: Martin Luther King, Jr., was born on Tuesday, 15 January 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia.

Question: What were the names of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s family members?

Answer: Martin Luther King, Jr. was the second child and first son to the Reverend Martin Luther King and Alberta Williams King. He had one sister, Christine and one brother, Alfred Daniel.

Question: When was Martin Luther King, Jr. married, and did he have any children?

Answer: He married Coretta Scott on June 18, 1953. They had four children: Yolanda Denise (born 1955), Martin Luther III (born 1957), Dexter Scott (born 1961) and Bernice Albertine (born 1963).

Question: What did Martin Luther King, Jr. study?

Answer: Martin Luther King, Jr. was a very bright student and a talented speaker. When he was nineteen he graduated from Morehouse College in Atlanta with a BA degree in Sociology. In 1951, he graduated from the Crozer Theological Seminary with a BA of Divinity, which qualified him to become a pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. King also received his Ph.D. in Systematic Theology from Boston University in 1955.

Question: When did Martin Luther King, Jr. deliver his famous speech "I have a dream ..."?

Answer: On 28 August 1963 Martin Luther King, Jr. organised a now historic march to Washington to show the importance of solving the nation's racial problems. About 250,000 people gathered and listened to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s speech when he uttered the immortal words: "I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin, but by the content of their character".

Question: What sort of discrimination did he fight against?

Answer: Martin Luther King, Jr. experienced segregation early in life. When he was six years old, two white playmates told him that they were not allowed to play with him any longer. His mother explained to him that it was because they now attended segregated schools, but assured him that he was as good as anybody else. His father told him the story of the father of the Reformation, Martin Luther, and said that both of them now should have his name.
On 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks, an African American woman, refused to surrender her bus seat to a white passenger, and as a result she was arrested for violating the city's segregation law. Activists protested and organised a boycott of the buses for one day and chose Martin Luther King, Jr. as their leader. This protest continued until the buses became desegregated. Under this time, about a year, Martin Luther King, Jr. was constantly harassed with death threats and bombing of his house.

Question: What were his dreams?

Answer: That all people would someday be sisters and brothers in a world governed by equality, justice, and peace.

Question: Why was Martin Luther King, Jr. awarded the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize?

Answer: As Gunnar Jahn, Chairman of the Nobel Committee, said in his presentation speech: "He is the first person in the Western world to have shown us that a struggle can be waged without violence. He is the first to make the message of brotherly love a reality in the course of his struggle, and he has brought this message to all men, to all nations and races.

Today we pay tribute to Martin Luther King, the man who has never abandoned his faith in the unarmed struggle he is waging, who has suffered for his faith, who has been imprisoned on many occasions, whose home has been subject to bomb attacks, whose life and the lives of his family have been threatened, and who nevertheless has never faltered.

To this undaunted champion of peace the Nobel Committee of the Norwegian Parliament has awarded the Peace Prize for the year 1964."

Question: When did Martin Luther King, Jr. die and where is he buried?

Answer: Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated on 4 April 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee, where he was trying to help the striking garbage workers. The funeral was held on 9 April 1968 at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.

Sources:

The King Center (http://www.thekingcenter.org/)

Irwin Abrams: The Nobel Peace Prize Laureates. An Illustrated Biographical History 1901-2001. Science History Publications, USA, 2001

Øivind Stenersen, Ivar Libæk and  Asle Sveen: The Nobel Peace Prize: Laureates 1901-2000. Oslo: Cappelen, 2001

First published 14 May 2008

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Text retrieved at http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1964/king-faq.html
Image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/thomashawk/3338623918

July 20, 2009. 40th Anniversary of the Moon Landing

"Apollo 11 was the first manned mission to land on the Moon. The first steps by humans on another planetary body were taken by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on July 20, 1969. The astronauts also returned to Earth the first samples from another planetary body. Apollo 11 achieved its primary mission - to perform a manned lunar landing and return the mission safely to Earth - and paved the way for the Apollo lunar landing missions to follow." National Air and Space Museum. Smithsonian

Read, listen, and watch to learn more about the mission at NASA's website

Edgar Alan Poe

"Edgar Allan Poe (January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor and literary critic, and is considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective-fiction genre." Read more.

In the Bicentennial of his birth, we'd like to recommend you four books available at the library. Please, search our catalog!

February 12 2009: Abraham Lincoln’s 200th birthday

The basic facts about Abraham Lincoln are familiar.

• He was born in Kentucky in a log cabin so small it is hard to imagine how his entire family slept in it.
• The family moved to Indiana where he was raised.
• Off to Illinois, the lanky Lincoln became a frontier lawyer, served as a state legislator and won election to the Presidency at a time when the nation’s very survival was at risk.
• Inaugurated in 1861, he served throughout the Civil War, working to break the grip of slavery and to put the country back together until an assassin brought him down.

A common man forged in uncommon times, Lincoln is the model American leader.
Read a short biography, view an extensive timeline, meet his family, take a virtual tour of the places important in Lincoln’s life, re-discover his words and speeches, including his famous Gettysburg Address translated into 29 different languages, and ask yourself “Did You Know?”

Source:

OfficialBicentennial Commission
http://www.lincolnbicentennial.gov/lincolns-life/default.aspx


More information about Lincoln and the Bicentennial:

The Abraham Lincoln blog
Abraham Lincoln Bookshop, Chicago
The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, Springfield, Illinois
Springfield Illinois Bicentennial Commision
Illinois Lincoln Bicentennial Commission
The Library of Congress

Art Workshop

Conmemorating the 11S, the library invites you to the art workshop "La paz es posible", featuring artist Beatríz Papotto. It'll be next September 11, at ICANA Belgrano (3 de Febrero 821 Buenos Aires, Argentina) at 3.30 pm.

We'll be waiting for you!

Ray and Halloween

Para este autor, Halloween fue un hecho muy importante de su niñez y juventud, lo cual quedó reflejado en gran parte de su obra literaria. Ray afirma que necesitamos símbolos, ceremonias, y obras de arte que nos ayuden a aceptar la "realidad intolerable de la muerte".

Si querés vivir el espíritu de Halloween con la magia de Bradbury, te recomiendo "The October Country", un libro de cuentos, que está en la biblioteca en la sección Fiction. Su lectura requiere un nivel de inglés hi-intermediate. Otra opción del mismo autor es "The Halloween Tree", cuya lectura es más sencilla.

También, si querés saber más sobre Ray, podés visitar su sitio web, que incluye fotos, videos y un foro donde podés participar con tus comentarios.

Fuentes consultadas:

Leonard, Larry. (2007). Ray Bradbury : The October Man. http://oregonmag.com/Bradbury1001.htm

Mogen, David. Ray bradbury. -- Boston : Twayne, c1986. 186 p.

Happy Halloween!

En ICANA festejamos Halloween cada 31 de octubre. En el hall de entrada cuelgan de las paredes calaveras, brujas y calabazas. En las clases los alumnos se disfrazan y hay concursos que premian al mejor disfraz.

Si querés aprender sobre la historia de esta festividad, te recomiendo visitar el informe especial que le dedica The History Channel.com (en inglés).

Además, si deseas que publique tus fotos de Halloween en este blog, envialas a ref1@bcl.edu.ar

Happy Spring Day!

Hey, Feliz día! Por fin se va el invierno hasta el año que viene. Hoy es un día especial en Argentina, que es vivido con mucha alegría en las calles y los parques. A propósito, encontré en la Wikipedia un artículo sobre la primavera, en inglés.

See you!

(ilustración: Andy Warhol. Flowers, 1970)