Authors Jeff Chang and Andy Hall at University of Alaska Southeast
Mr. Chang’s talk covers themes from campus protests to corporate marketing campaigns, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to Trayvon Martin. His presentation will be a powerful, unique, and timely discussion of cultural history and the idea of racial progress.
Juneau, Alaska
Date of Press Release: March 16, 2015
Ground-breaking, award winning author Jeff Chang will speak on the UAS Auke Lake campus Monday, March 23rd at 7:30pm in the Egan Lecture Hall. The presentation is part of the University of Alaska Bartlett Lecture series. Mr. Chang's illustrated (via comic strips and contemporary art) lecture will focus on his latest book Who We Be: The Colorization of America (2014).
Mr. Chang’s talk covers themes from campus protests to corporate marketing campaigns, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to Trayvon Martin. His presentation will be a powerful, unique, and timely discussion of cultural history and the idea of racial progress.
“We’re sort of in this paradoxical moment,” said Chang in a video interview. “On the one hand, there’s more cultural desegregation than we’ve ever seen, but on the other, we are re-segregating, in our homes in our schools, even in our social lives. And that feels like we’re going backwards 50 years. So I’d like to draw attention to these kinds of paradoxes, to help us think through, have these conversations about what it means for us to be moving towards a truly multicultural society.”
Mr. Chang is the recipient of many literary honors, including the American Book Award and the Asian American Literary Award. Utne Reader named him one of “50 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World.”
Mr. Chang is the Executive Director of the Institute for Diversity in the Arts at Stanford University. His first book, Can’t Stop Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation, won the American Book Award, and is only ostensibly about hip-hop; it's really a cultural history. His current book, Who We Be: The Colorization of America, examines the cultural transformation of the U.S. over the last three decades.
More information about Jeff:
Contact: 796-6325 Tara Olson, Student Activities Coordinator
Lifelong Alaskan and author Andy Hall will make a presentation Friday, March 27 at 7 p.m. in the Egan Library. Mr. Hall is the author of Denali’s Howl, The Deadliest Climbing Disaster on America's Wildest Peak, (2014) a non-fiction account of the tragic 1967 Wilcox Expedition. His presentation is part of the Sound and Motion series and the 25th Anniversary celebration of the Egan Library. Alaska Airlines and Aspen Hotels sponsor his visit.
In 1967, twelve young men attempted to climb Alaska’s Mount McKinley—known to the locals as Denali—one of the most popular and deadly mountaineering destinations in the world. Only five survived. Mr. Hall, son of the park superintendent at the time, investigates the tragedy. He spent years tracking down survivors, lost documents, and recordings of radio communications.
In Denali’s Howl, Mr. Hall reveals the full story of an expedition facing conditions conclusively established here for the first time: At an elevation of nearly 20,000 feet, these young men endured an “arctic super blizzard,” with howling winds of up to 300 miles an hour and wind chill that freezes flesh solid in minutes. All this without the high-tech gear and equipment climbers use today.
As well as the story of the men caught inside the storm, Denali’s Howl is the story of those caught outside it trying to save them—Hall’s father among them. The book gives readers a detailed look at the culture of climbing then and now and raises uncomfortable questions about each player in this tragedy. Was enough done to rescue the climbers, or were their fates sealed when they ascended into the path of this unprecedented storm?
“A page-turner that's as much about memory as it is about mountaineering." - San Francisco Bay Guardian"A labor of love...an indelible portrait of the wilderness of [Denali] and the culture of 1960s mountaineering." - Book PageAndy Hall holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Alaska Anchorage, and has enjoyed a long career in Alaska as writer and editor, working at several small newspapers and for 16 years as editor and publisher of Alaska magazine and general manager of The Milepost. In addition to being an author, he is a commercial salmon fisherman in Cook Inlet and a ski coach at Chugiak High School. He lives in Chugiak Alaska with his wife, Melissa DeVaughn, and their two children, Roan and Reilly.
Be sure to check out the recent Christian Science Monitor interview with Andy Hall for more information.
Contact: andy.hall.alaska@gmail.com, 907-240-4255