Let's Talk About It! ALA Public Programs Office
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Discussion Themes


"We humanize what is going on in the world and in ourselves only by speaking of it and in the course of speaking of it, we learn to be human." Hannah Arendt, Men in Dark Times

Program Materials
The Let's Talk About It program is more than a book discussion model. It is a multi-faceted way to experience a directed examination of contemporary life and culture through literature. The readings are selections from our culture's most outstanding works and consist of novels, plays, fairy tales, biographies and short stories. Libraries interested in hosting a Let's Talk About It series using a past theme of the ALA Let's Talk About It program, can download for each of the themes listed below, the following materials:

  • summary of the theme
  • book list
  • humanities scholar's essay on the theme
  • annotatations of the book list which illuminate the theme
  • supplementary texts with brief summaries
  • "How To" discussion programming guide

The Themes

  1. Being Ethnic, Becoming American: Struggles, Successes, Symbols

  2. Between Two Worlds: Stories of Estrangement and Homecoming

  3. Contemporary Japanese Literature

  4. Demons, Golems, and Dybbuks: Monsters of the Jewish Imagination

  5. Destruction or Redemption: Images of Romantic Love

  6. The End of Life: Conversations on Death and Dying for Contemporary Americans

  7. End of the World or World Without End: Readings for the Millennium

  8. Exploring the West...Whose West?

  9. Family: The Way We Were, The Way We Are: Seasons in the Contemporary American Family

  10. Individual Rights and Community in America

  11. Isabella's Sisters: Women Creating Worlds

  12. The Journey Inward: Women's Autobiography

  13. Liberty and Violence: The Heritage of the French Revolution

  14. Long Gone: The Literature and Culture of African American Migration

  15. Making a Living, Making a Life: Work and Its Rewards in a Changing America

  16. The Many Realms of King Arthur

  17. A Mind of Her Own: Fathers and Daughters in a Changing World

  18. The Nation That Works: Conversations on American Pluralism and Identity

  19. New American Worlds: Writing the Hemisphere

  20. Not for Children Only: Children's Classics for Adults

  21. One Vision, Many Voices: Latino Literature in the U.S.

  22. Rebirth of a Nation: Nationalism and the Civil War

  23. Seeds of Change: The Encounter That Transformed the World

  24. Sovereign Worlds: Native Peoples Reclaim Their Lives and Heritage

  25. What America Reads: Myth Making in Popular Fiction

  26. Your Heart’s Desire: Sex and Love in Jewish Literature

Grant Information
 Grants for these series are not available through ALA. Libraries seeking grants to host a Let's Talk About It series should visit the Online Resource Center for Library Cultural Programming. The Grants section lists several funding organizations that may be useful.

Gentle Reminder About Copyright
The American Library Association is the copyright owner of all of the essays and annotations associated with the Let’s Talk About It themes listed above. The credit lines embedded in the program materials and/or sponsor and funder logos must remain on all published (print and web) materials derived from these Let’s Talk About It themes.

 
Copyright 2007 ALA Let's Talk About It!