[Event] Betita Martinez at CSULA!!

Join MALCS de CSULA for a truly historic evening!!
Wednesday, October 8th, 2008, from 6:30 - 8:00 p.m. ~ save the date!!!

[Conferences] Check this out!!!

THE UCLA CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF WOMEN
in conjunction with
THE USC CENTER FOR FEMINIST RESEARCH
announce

CALL FOR PAPERS
2009 Thinking Gender

THE NINETEENTH ANNUAL GRADUATE STUDENT RESEARCH CONFERENCE

Friday, February 6, 2009
UCLA FACULTY CENTER

Thinking Gender is a public conference highlighting graduate student research on women, sexuality and gender across all disciplines and historical periods. We invite submissions for individual papers or preconstituted panels. This year, we especially welcome feminist research on:

- women and media
- local feminist issues and concerns in Southern California
- women and the environment (e.g., ecofeminism, the built environment, urban planning, architecture)
- women and political activism (e.g., women in government, women and war/peace)
- embodiment (e.g., disability, genetics)
- women in sports

For individual papers, please submit an abstract (250 word maximum), a CV (2 pages maximum, no resumes, please), and a brief bibliography (1 page maximum). For panels, please submit a 250-word description of the panel topic in addition to the materials required for the individual paper submissions. Please reference the submission guidelines at http://www.csw.ucla.edu/thinkinggender.html, and note that only complete applications adhering to the stated guidelines will be accepted.

Deadline for Submissions: Wednesday, October 22, 2008, by midnight.
We will only accept completed submissions emailed by the deadline, without exception.
Please send submissions to: thinkinggender@women.ucla.edu

UCLA Center for the Study of Women
Box 957222/ Public Affairs 1500
Los Angeles, CA 90095-7222
310-825-0590
http://www.women.ucla.edu/csw/
Email: thinkinggender@women.ucla.edu

USC Center for Feminist Research
Mark Taper Hall of Humanities, 442
3501 Trousdale Parkway
Los Angeles, CA 90089-4352
http://www.usc.edu/dept/cfr/
Email: cfr@usc.edu

LOTERIA!!!

[Meeting] On tap at Antigua...!

Take a look at what we'll be doing in our meeting on Saturday, May 24th, at Antigua Cultural Coffee House ~

• Check-In!
• Update on "Mujeres en Movimiento Panel"!!
• Update and Discussion on Loteria Night !!!
• --> Should we decide to proceed with Loteria, we'll then move into a more prolonged chat on things that still need to be done and how to get them done within the next couple of days!
• Upcoming elections...?
• Schedule for summer....??
• MALCS Summer Institute
• Check-Out!!!! =)

We will start at 10 a.m. at

Antigua Cultural Coffee House

4836 Huntington Drive South

Los Angeles, CA 90032

Hope to see you there! =)

[Event] Mujeres en Movimiento Panel: TUESDAY!!! =)

Loteria Planning Meeting y Mas!!!

I hope that everyone is doing well this weekend, especially as I know our thoughts are particularly with la familia Padilla Morales. <3 With those good energies in mind, please allow me to humbly transition to some BIG THINGS that are coming up and that we need to make some collective decisions about....

Loteria Planning Meeting:
Can folks meet either Tuesday after the CSGS Conference for about an hour (4:30 - 5:30,or 5:00 - 6:00?), or Wednesday from 3:15 to 4:00?? It's really important that we have a face-to-face update early in the week, and also we need to have a more formal sit-down planning meeting either Friday or Saturday. For the second meeting time, which hours might work best? Let's start throwing some out!

Loteria Updating:
Please continue to send out whatever updated thoughts, news,etc. you might have on our gran evento! =) Much`issimas gracias a Margarita for handling the goodies, and Adilia, Carmen, y Erika for looking into the room situation. I am finishing the Event regsitration paperwork, but QUICK QUESTION FOR EVERYONE: what do we want to raffle as the grand prize??? I am stuck on the budget request because I need to put down specific amounts for any tickets/etc. that we want to have as the big premios. Please send back specific suggestions of shows, etc., so we can figure this out today!!! =) (Paperwork will be submitted tomorrow, 12.5., in the afternoon.)

CSGS Conference:
If you are still interested in being part of the panel that will present on MALCS during the afternoon session, please hit me up! It is a really fun conversation to participate in, and the "prep work" for it is not as intimidating as you might think. ;) Also, who's down to table?? Let me know asap; gracias!

MALCS Bookmarks and Outreach:
Gracias a Carmen, Eva, y Martha for making the MALCS bookmarks! They are too cute and were a definite hit at the Teatro Chicana event. To everyone: can we think of more ways that we can continue to outreach this quarter and advertise our upcoming events? The bookmarks are dope but I think we will run out by Tuesday... also, please consider making classroom announcements even this week to start getting the word about everything out and getting everyone excited!!

Ok, mujeres, I know there is a lot going on right now, so I will try and cut this somewhat short and stop for now. Take care, mujeres, and let's be in contact!!!

!Nos vemos pronto!

[Event] EpiCentro Poets Event with USEU

Please click on the small version of our flyer above to view it full-size....y claro come and support Unión Salvadoreña de Estudiantes Universitarios (USEU) and MALCS de CSULA as we bring EpiCentro Poets to campus on Wednesday, May 7th from 7:30 - 9:30 in the Golden Eagle Ballroom. Hope to see you there!!!

Work from Working Potluck: Part One!

Buenos días a todas~*

¡Gracias por asistir nuestra junta anoche y compartir toda su energía e ideas! I will send out a more comprehensive version of "minutos" from last night within the next couple of days. In the meanwhile, here are some of the more important points to keep in mind that we discussed last night about getting MALCS recognition/recruiting/etc....!

*Finishing the Constitution
Attached is the sample constitution outline from the folks at CSULA. Adilia agreed to talk to Frangelo and check again to find out what exactly happened to the Constitution that we had on file --> A, can you please (!) do that within these next two days so that way people do not need to stress so much on updating their articles in case he does find it??
In the event we do need to submit a whole new one, everyone needs to be done with their articles and emailing them to the MALCS lista by Friday, 8:00 a.m. I can compile it all at that point and hand it off to Erika in time for the funding meeting.

*Articles that We Each Agreed to Take On:
Article III - Adilia
Article IV - KP
Article V - Mica
Article VI - Reina
Article VII - Carmen
The MALCS website (http://malcs.net) should be helpful in getting these done. =)

* Funding Meeting: 2:00 p.m. Friday
Erika will attend the mandatory meeting on Friday in the Golden Eagle. Anyone else who can show up and support along with her, it would be GREATLY appreciated!!

* Recruitment at Cal State L.A. VIP Day: 9:00 - 12:30 on Saturday
Erika and Mica will be there at 9:00 to set up our table/part of table next to the Chicana/o Studies department. Reina will be joining us at 10, and Carmen and Ninozka will also be coming later to help talk to new CSULA admits and hopefully recruit more mujeres into our fold! =) It will be at the Eagle Nest Gym; I'll forward the announcement about it later today/tomorrow.
Also, Ninozka very dope-ly offered to make us flyers to hand out that day. They will include the MALCS logo and contact information (the blog, MySpace, CHS Dept. address to track us down, and malcsdecsula@yahoo.com address because only members can post to the googlegroups lista), etc. as a basic recruitment tool. N., what would be the best way for us to get copies of the flyer before Saturday morning so that Erika and I can pass some out to the early birds??


Okey dokey - I think that is about all for now! My apologies for the very direct, no-frills, possibly confusing throwing out of all this information. IMore to come, and in a more organized fashion!, soon!

Thanks again, mujeres, and let me know if there is anything that can be clarified.

Peace and blessings,
Mica =)

Otra Madre Activista en Chicago...!!

Author: Pepe Lozano
People's Weekly World Newspaper, 02/07/08 14:46

Photo of immigrant rights leader Flor Crisostomo in Chicago, by Pepe Lozano

[To see the actual webpage version of this story, visit http://www.pww.org/article/articleview/12452/1/409 ]



CHICAGO — Josué, 14, Juan, 11 and Paloma, 9, live with their grandmother in a small rural town in the state of Guerrero, Mexico. They have not seen their mother, Flor Crisostomo, 28, since she crossed the Arizona desert in June 2000, to find work in the U.S. so she could support them. Crisostomo was arrested during a 2006 immigration raid at a pallet-making company here. After two years of exhaustive legal appeals, Homeland Security ordered her to return to Mexico by Jan. 28. But she decided to take sanctuary at the Adalberto United Methodist Church on the city’s northwest side. “I came here seven years ago because NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement) made it impossible to feed my children in my hometown and that situation has only gotten worse,” Crisostomo told the World, speaking in Spanish. She said the Mexican government predicts that with the final reduction of tariffs on corn, beans, sugar and powdered milk under NAFTA policies, as many as a million more out-of-work Mexican farmers will try crossing the deadly U.S.-Mexican border to find work. “I am not leaving. I am taking a stand of civil disobedience,” Crisostomo said. “I believe with all my heart that the U.S. and Mexico must end the system of exploiting undocumented labor. “The raids and deportations make undocumented workers live in fear,” she added. “The no-match letters force us into worse jobs. But even a poor job here is better than no job.” (The Social Security Administration mails no-match letters to employers, stating that an employee’s social security number does not match SSA’s records. Many result from clerical error; they are not cause for firings.) Crisostomo’s experience illustrates a root problem of the current immigration system. At the same time Homeland Security and anti-immigrant and anti-worker laws make it harder for undocumented workers to survive here, NAFTA’s policies have devastated the rural economies of Mexico, putting family farmers out of work. (see related story on page 4) Elvira Arellano also stood up for immigrant rights and for her U.S. citizen son. She was in sanctuary at the same church for a year before she was deported back to Mexico last summer. She and Crisostomo are good friends. “It’s a very important time to fight for immigration reform during election time,” Arellano said, in a phone interview, speaking in spanish from Mexico. She added that people need to go out and vote for change so Congress and the next president can act on immigration reform. “Flor is a part of my family and is a very important person who was there for me while I was in sanctuary,” said Arellano. “She is a mother who has sacrificed a lot for her children despite all the difficulties. We in Mexico are in solidarity with her, we wish her courage and we are praying for her and all the undocumented workers in the U.S.” Crisostomo hopes that the U.S. and Mexico will realize one way to fix the broken immigration laws and make the borders safe and secure is to renegotiate NAFTA and other financial agreements that have destroyed local economies. She said she is fighting for all immigrant families in the U.S. “I will not be a symbol of fear to spread among my people. I hope that adding my grain of sand to the struggle will help to get the U.S. Congress to act now,” she said. Crisostomo knows that by taking this action there is little chance that she will ever achieve legal status to stay in the U.S. “I may face time in prison. But when I do return to my children, I will not return, as so many have, empty-handed and unable to provide for them. I will be able to give them the only thing I can pass on to them: My dignity.”
plozano@pww.org

[Minutos] First Meeting of WINTER08!! =)

Minutos from First MALCS Meeting of Winter 2008
January 16th, 2007 ~ 4:00 – 5:30 p.m.
Integrated Humanities Center

Mujeres Presentes: Margarita, Profa. D., Erika, Reina, Adilia, Lucila, Michaela


I. Check-In
After deciding to move our meeting from the lively Cross Cultural Centers to the IHC, we all shared some of our goals for the Winter quarter with each other. (Thanks to the Profa. for the great prompt!)

II. MALCSista Development
a. In the spirit of the discussion during the last meeting of Fall 2007, we talked about the importance of making time for both planning and personal development during MALCS meetings.
b. We agreed that there should be distinct times to do business (planning) and distinct times to have discussions specifically focused on our growth as mujeres.
c. We all seemed to like the idea of having different mujeres volunteer to facilitate meetings ahead of time and be catalysts for discussion.
i. As part of facilitating the meeting, mujeres can bring in a poem/topic/etc. of their own choice to share with the group and talk about!
ii. [Note: So who’s down for next time?? J]

III. Winter Events
a) Vagina Monologues Update
i) Mark your calendars! The Vagina Monologues will be presented on Friday, February 22nd from 7 – 9 p.m. in the Golden Eagle.
ii) Volunteers are needed to make this wonderful event happen! The site
will be open from 5-9 p.m. on the 22nd for decorations and set-up.
iii. “Sponsorship” will be $10. All proceeds will go to the East L.A. Women’s Center.
iv. Adilia gave us the following updates:
(1) Auditions took place on Monday, 14.1., and over 20 mujeres came out to read.
(2) Our very own Profa. as well as Eva are among the mujeres who we will see on stage the 22nd…! J
(3) If anyone knows of a good band/musicians to perform throughout the evening, please let her know.
(4) Finally, don’t forget to volunteer if you can! For any further questions or information, Adilia is the woman to see!

b) Thesis Workshop
i) Per the feedback from Fall, we wanted to have another grad school workshop in the Winter with an original proposed date of Wednesday, Jan. 23rd, 2008.
ii) The 23rd, however, is the CSGS OPEN HOUSE at 3:15 p.m….!
iii) We thus decided that a better option for this quarter is to have a Thesis Workshop on Monday, January 28th. It will be facilitated by Lucila following her groundbreaking thesis work in CHS and equally as important/successful Thesis Workshop from the 2005-2006 school year.
iv) Save the date: Mon., January 28th at 3:15 p.m. This is a workshop you won’t want to miss!

c) Plática by Lucia Muñoz on Violence Against Women in Guatemala
i) Another big date you will want to be there for: Tuesday, February 26th at 6:00 p.m.
ii) Lucia Muñoz, founder of Mujeres Iniciando en las Américas (MIA), will be on campus to speak about the Femicidio en Guatemala. This is the 2nd time in 2 Winters that MALCS has had the privilege of hosting Ms. Muñoz for such an important event.
iii) She will also be bringing with her a man who was in the guerrilla movement to talk about the state of the country today.
iv) As part of sponsoring the event, MALCS will be forwarding $100 to Ms. Muñoz as honorarium.

d) International Women's Day/Día de la Mujer
i) The campus celebration for Día de la Mujer will be on Thursday, March 6th.
ii) Profa. D. suggested that MALCS do an event in the community to commemorate the importance of both the day and the month of March.
iii) Many great ideas were shared, including:
(1) Showing a film
(2) Getting involved with the PUENTE project (which is in the heart of Boyle Heights!) à Note: Margarita has been very involved with PUENTE in the past, and suggested that even if not this time, it would be great for MALCSistas to consider some type of involvement with PUENTE in the future e.g. mentoring
(3) Doing something for the Chicana/Latino community in PasaDENA
iv) In the interests of time, we decided that yes, we would do an event in the community, to take place after March 8th, and to be discussed more in depth at future meetings!

e) New Sanctuary Movement
i) Profa. D. shared information about a new interfaith movement that is taking place in our own backyards.
ii) Specifically, there is a current project to offer support to an undocumented woman named Yolanda Santuario and her daughter who are living in Immanuel Presbyterian Church on Barindo and Wilshire Boulevard.
iii) La Profa. more information on detailed ways that folks can help them. If you are interested in visiting with Yolanda and her daughter, please speak to La Profa; gracias!


IV. Saturday Breakfast/Brunch at Homegirl Cafe
So many good MALCS events, so many good times! On Saturday, Jan. 26th at 10 a.m., come grub and chillax with your mujeres at the Homegirl Café, 130 W. Bruno Street, L.A. 90012. (The Café is located on the corner of Alameda and Bruno, just a few blocks north of Plazita Olvera/Union Station). Thanks to Margarita, we will have a nice set-up in which to chat and enjoy each other’s company; no formal business, just fun brunch! J


V. "Word on the Street" (announcements/updates/etc.)
Other notitas that came up during the meeting included:
i) MALCS has not yet been formally recognized as a group for this Quarter. (There are some issues with whether or not we have a Constitution on file?) Adilia and La Profa. are in the process of getting to the bottom of this apparent mix-up!!
ii) La Profa. will be taking charge of the MALCS account as there have been some questions/uncertainties about how our funds stand in the past.
iii) The Garment Workers Center is creating a Rapid Response Network to deal with redadas; they will have a meeting on Monday, January 28th, 2008. For more information, ask la Profa.
iv) El Huarachito Restaurant on Eastern and Floral is a great place to eat/study that is also really interested in working with students! Support your community small businesses and check them out!
v) Eagle Fest (the campus Open House-type event for prospective students) will be on Saturday, Feb. 16th. MALCS will have a presence there, so start clearing that date so you can come and be part of the outreach!



** Gracias a todas por su energía; it will be a lovely Winter indeed! =) **