Community members invited to join in series of discussions, panel presentations on three popular books covering the topic of race and racism.

SOMERVILLE – The Somerville Public Library and the Office of Somerville Commissions invite your participation in newly-created book discussion series on Race & Racism.

The Somerville Library Book Series on Race and Racism is a program that features three separate books and discussions, plus a panel discussion co-sponsored by the Office of Somerville Commissions from January to April on every third Thursday evening at the Main Branch Library (79 Highland Ave.) from 7 to 8:30 p.m.

 

The books are nationally acclaimed and include a lawyer’s analysis of the United States’ mass incarceration system, a first person’s perspective of growing up and living, as a black woman in South Carolina and New York, and the advice about race and racism from a black father to his teenage son. Each month one of the three books will be discussed by the evening’s participants, with a final event in April consisting of a panel presentation along with question/answer portion for the audience.

 

Book discussions and book titles are as follows:

· January 21: Between the World and Me by Te-Nahisi Coates (National Book Award winner for Nonfiction, 2015)

· February 18: Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson

· March 17: The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander (winner of multiple awards, including an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Nonfiction, 2011)

· April 21: panel discussion

 

The panelists for the final discussion are:

· Joyce Angela Jellison, J.D., Urban College of Boston 

· Guerlince (“Lince”) Semerzier, Executive Director, Haitian Coalition of Somerville

· Sassiane Estany, Program Coordinator, Center for Teen Empowerment Somerville

· Victor Nascimento, Massachusetts Municipal Association

 

For a full description of each of the three books, visit http://www.somervillepubliclibrary.org.