Transcript The 2009 Américas Award for Children’s and Young Adult Literature About the Award The Américas Award is given in recognition of U.S.

The 2009 Américas Award
for Children’s and Young Adult
Literature
About the Award
The Américas Award is given in recognition of U.S. works of fiction, poetry,
folklore, or selected non-fiction (from picture books to works for young adults)
published in the previous year in English or Spanish that authentically and
engagingly portray Latin America, the Caribbean, or Latinos in the United
States.
By combining both and linking the Americas, the award reaches beyond
geographic borders, as well as multicultural-international boundaries, focusing
instead upon cultural heritages within the hemisphere. The award is sponsored
by the national Consortium of Latin American Studies Programs (CLASP).
The award winners and commended titles are selected for their 1) distinctive
literary quality; 2) cultural contextualization; 3) exceptional integration of text,
illustration and design; and 4) potential for classroom use.
2009 Américas
Winner
Detail, Just In Case
2009 Américas
Winner
“Some of the U.S. Army nurses
are young Lakota Sioux nuns
who have come here to help us
even though their own tribe in
the north has suffered so much,
for so long, starving and dying
in their own distant wars.
One of the nuns is called
Josefina Two Bears. She
promises to take care of all the
orphans from the camps.”
Américas Honorable Mention
Américas Honorable Mention
“Like, no matter where you
might be-there’ll always be
people who are gonna get in your
face…because, you know what,
where you are doesn’t change
who you are. I thought of that
while I was sitting with Sheri
waiting for the bus, feeling more
like myself than I had in a long
time-maybe ever.”
Américas Honorable Mention
Américas
Commended Title
Américas
Commended Title
Américas
Commended Title
Detail, Baila, Nana, Baila
“There was once a shoemaker who had a
shop close to the king’s palace. He was the
world’s most unhappy man. All day long, as
he sewed leather and nailed soles onto shoes,
he sang to himself:
If you’re born to be a poor man, then poor you’re
going to be.
If you’re born to be a poor man, then poor you’re
going to be.
The king often passed by the cobbler’s shop
in his carriage, and every time he leaned out
the window to listen, he heard the shoemaker
singing the same old song:
If you’re born to be a poor man, then poor you’re
going to be.
If you’re born to be a poor man, then poor you’re
going to be.”
Américas
Commended Title
Américas
Commended Title
“Our country is at war with itself.
Argentina has become a battlefield, a
country of death and of mourners.
Just as we are brother and sister,
Eduardo, and our quarrels tear at our
hearts, so our people fight one
another to death. It is the cruelest
kind of war.”
Américas
Commended Title
“Them people who only
now come from India-they
not like that at all.’” “But we
not like that, either,” said
Ricki. ‘”I don’t think I could
be like one of those long-ago
people that first come from
India to Trinidad.”
“Me neither,” said Grandpa.
“Is not easy to leave home and
go someplace where you
different from everybody else.
Them long-ago Indian people
didn’t have it easy when they
first come here. My own
grandfather used to tell me
about it. They didn’t have it
easy at all.”
Detail, Divali Rose
Américas
Commended Title
“We were extremely poor, so poor
that our clothes came from
donations and second-hand cloting
stores – in fact, second-hand store
clothes were a luxury for us. … In
the union we worked for five dollars
a week at first, and later 10 dollars
a week. … All my children were
raised in a lifestyle of extreme
deprivation – they didn’t have toys
or clothes.”
“’A degenerate?’ My voice quivers.
‘Mami, Mami. Please understand. I’m no
degenerate. I’m your daughter. Why are
you being so cruel? All you do is hurt me
and hurt me. You have to stop.’
She turns to me with such rage in her
face, I’m afraid she’s going to slap me.
‘You’re sick! Sick and demented. You
need a psychiatrist!’
‘You’re the one who needs therapy! I’m
going to start supplicating to Santa
Barbara so she’ll turn you gay! How do
you like that?’
“Shhh. The neighbors.’ She rushes to
close the sliding doors.
I calm down. ‘I’ve always wanted a
mother to understand and support me. But
you just can’t do it, can you?’”
Américas
Commended Title
Américas
Commended Title
“They want something better, Lisa told
herself. They want to move away
from this trailer. Cold wind
whispered through the cracks, gutters
dripped with the last of the rain, Pecas
bumped somewhere under the trailer,
and the floor seemed to lurch like a
ship. Were they on a wide dusty sea
in the middle of nowhere? Lisa knew
that if she went outside onto the small
porch, the night would be black, a
color seldom used in her drawings
because she had enough of it in life.”
Américas
Commended Title
“My mom, she really objected to me
being a political animal. But what
happens if you were born with a mind?
Why is thinking about shopping better
than thinking about the state of the world
you live in? Tell me that. She says I’m
too young to go around analyzing how
the world is run. And one day, when I
was going on and on about global
warming, she actually said, ‘It’s none of
your business, Jacob.’ She actually said
that. Are you getting to the point where
you understand where I get all this
attitude? Are you getting this? Anyway,
one day, I came home wearing a Che
Guevara T-shirt. ‘Where do you get these
things?’ she asked. ‘You don’t even know
what Che Guevara stood for.’”
Américas
Commended Title
“…around the kitchen they sweep,
feet tapping, water dripping, sponge
wiping, towel snapping.
My mother’s voice joins my
father’s, hers high and his low.
Together they tango across the
room with the leftover tamales.”
Detail, Kitchen Dance
Américas
Commended Title
“This book is your personal
invitation to become part of one of the
most exciting youth movements of our
time: PeaceJam’s Global Call to
Action. PeaceJam is bringing young
people together with Nobel Peace
Laureates to tackle the toughest issues
facing our planet – issues ranging from
basic needs, such as access to water, to
basic rights, such as social justice and
human security. Change starts here,
and we are inviting you to become a
part of it. How will you answer the
call?”
Américas
Commended Title
Américas
Commended Title
Américas
Commended Title
“Hoping to leave our poverty behind
and start a new and better life, my
family emigrated illegally from Mexico
to California in the late 1940s and
began working in the fields. From the
time I was six years old, Toto and I
worked together alongside our parents.
He sang Mexican songs to me such as
‘Cielito Lindo’ and ‘Dos Arbolitos’
while we picked cotton in early fall and
winter in Corcoran. After we were
deported in 1957 by la migra and came
back legally, Roberto took care of me
like a father when he and I lived alone
for six months in Bonetti Ranch, a
migrant labor camp.”
Américas
Commended Title
“’If people are the smartest and most
powerful creatures in the world, does that
mean they are also the best and most
virtuous?’ asked one of the b’en.
‘Not necessarily,’ Ixkem answered. ‘We
Maya believe that everything has its
counterpart. There’s water because there’s
fire; there’s sky because there’s earth;
there’s man because there’s woman. The
large exists because of the small and the
good exists because of the bad. Everything
has its opposite. So there are good people
as well as bad.’”
Américas
Commended Title
“By the time I actually started sixth
grade, I felt like a burra – a donkey,
which was what they called the kids
who weren’t too smart. We had missed
a little more than a week of school.
Nothing was like it was supposed to
be. I wasn’t sure how to explain it
except that I felt very small.”
Américas
Commended Title
“As much as I liked the way chickens
tasted, I owed my life to one of them.
When I was about ten years, I had
gone upstate to a campground, and as
we were sitting around eating some
chicken, a great big nasty bear with
giant teeth came out of the woods
growling at us. Everybody ran away,
but as the bear came after us, wanting
to eat us humans, I threw a chicken leg
at him. This big bear, nasty as he was,
ate it, calmed down, and looked happy.
… Anyway, I got home safe, but when
I arrived at the door, all I wanted to do
was eat more chicken.”
Américas
Commended Title
“On each slaver, as soon as I’d been
through the hold with water and
people’s thirst was quenched, the
questions began, always the same:
‘Where are we? Are they going to kill
us now?’ Or the more gruesome
versions: ‘Are they going to eat us
now? Use our blood for paint? Use our
fat to caulk their ships? Use our skin
to make sails?’
‘You’re in Cartagena of the Indies,’ I
would tell them. ‘A land ruled by
Spain. The Portuguese brought you
here, but you will be sold to
Spaniards. They will not kill you, but
you will be their slaves.’”
Américas
Commended Title
2009
Américas Award for Children's and Young Adult Literature
Review Committee
Kristel Foster (Sunnyside Unified School District, Arizona)
Jamie Campbell Naidoo (University of Alabama)
Hollis Rudiger (Madison, Wisconsin)
Elena Gibbons Serapiglia (Yale University, Connecticut)
Patricia Velasco, chairperson (Teachers College, Columbia University, New York)
Award Coordinator
Julie Kline
CLASP Committee on Teaching and Outreach
c/o The Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
P.O. Box 413, Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53201
(414) 229-5986 phone; (414) 229-2879 fax
[email protected]
http://www4.uwm.edu/clacs/aa/index.cfm