BOOK DISCUSSIONS

The UC Davis Health System’s Interprofessional Book Club  takes up The Warmth of Other Suns in meetings starting today (Oct. 19) and continuing through Jan. 25.

The book club discussions will explore the connections between the Great Migration and social determinants of health and health disparities, said Jann Murray-García, assistant adjunct professor at the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing, who facilitates the book club discussions.

She added that the sessions will highlight the experiences of those who migrated to the Sacramento region and are now among the African American geriatric population served by the UC Davis Health System.

"To provide excellent health care to this population, we need to go beyond knowing that they are African Americans, to trying to understand their perspectives and interactions within our health system in the context of the history of our region and nation," Murray-García said. "We have to understand a population's history to fully understand the social determinants that lead to health disparities."

Read more, including meeting dates and details, in this UC Davis Health System news release.

The Campus Community Book Project is all about reading and talking — two kinds of talking, actually.

There are talks, as in panel discussions and faculty presentations. And there are talks, as in informal conversations, in which students, faculty and staff discuss the book project theme.

This year’s theme is the Great Migration, 1915 to 1970, when 6 million blacks fled the South, going north and west, and changed the face of the United States.

It had been vastly underreported until Isabel Wilkerson, a Pulitzer Prize winner with The New York Times, came along with The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction in 2010.

This is the book that the campus community is talking about in 2012-13 — one-on-one and in groups small and large; at lectures and panel discussions; and in connection with exhibitions and films, and with the Mondavi Center's five-day-long program Worlds of Discovery and Loss: The Art of Migration, comprising visual and performing art.

Formal programs are planned on the Davis and Sacramento campuses, and elsewhere in Sacramento, through fall quarter and into winter quarter, concluding Feb. 12 with Wilkerson’s talk and book signing at the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts.

The Warmth of Other Suns is the 11th book in the Campus Community Book Project, born out of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks as a way to inspire people to look at the world in different ways, to acknowledge and consider different perspectives, and to engage in respectful discussion. The Office of Campus Community Relations sponsors the projhect.

Panel discussions Oct. 24 and 30

Walker’s talk, “Race Becomes National: The Great Migration and the Loss of Northern Racial Innocence,” is scheduled from 12:10 to 1:30 p.m. Wednesday (Oct. 17) in the Mee Room, second floor, Memorial Union.

The October schedule also includes two panel discussions dealing with African Americans who migrated to Sacramento:

• Wednesday, Oct. 24 — “Stories of the Great Migration from Oak Park African-American Elders,” moderated by Carl Pinkston, African Research Institute, Sacramento, and Jann Murray-Garcia, adjunct professor, Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing. Noon-1 p.m., 1222 Education Building (lecture hall), 4610 X St., Sacramento.

• Tuesday, Oct. 30 — “A Conversation on the Migration and Prosperity of African-Americans in Sacramento.” 5:30-7:30 p.m., Underground Bookstore, 2814 35th St., Sacramento.

All lecture, talks and panel discussions listed here are open to the public, and all are free except the author's talk. Tickets for that event: mondaviarts.org or (530) 754-2787 or (800) 754-2787.

Check back here for more events as they draw closer, or look at the complete schedule.

Worlds of Discovery and Loss

The Department of Music, the Department of Theatre and Dance, and the UC Davis Humanities Institute join the Mondavi Center in presenting Worlds of Discovery and Loss: The Art of Migration, described as a look at the creative worlds generated by migration in its many forms.

Worlds of Discovery and Loss, Jan. 30 to Feb. 3, includes music, cabaret and dramatic art by UC Davis and visiting performers; and an art show — and explanations from the visiting artists on how cultural and geographic migration affects their work.

The show, Reflections on Migrations, Real and Imagined, features five emerging artists from California. Art professor Robin Hill curated the show, to be presented in the Mondavi Center’s lobby.

Here is the Worlds of Discovery and Loss schedule:

• Wednesday, Jan. 30 — A performance of Korean p’ansori (story-singing, by one person with a barrel drum) by Chan Park, associate professor of Korean language, literature and performance studies at Ohio State University. 8 p.m., Vanderhoef Studio Theatre.

• Thursday, Jan. 31 — Shinkoskey Noon Concert, Worlds of Discovery and Loss: The Art of Migration, by the Calder Quartet, Rootstock Percussion Trio and Mayumi Hama on marimba. 12:05 p.m., Yocha Dehe Grand Lobby.

• Thursday, Jan. 31 — Migration and Other Projects, a presentation by Master of Fine Arts candidates in dramatic art, with the support of the Institute for Exploration in Theatre, Dance and Performance. 8 p.m., Vanderhoef Studio Theatre.

• Friday, Feb. 1 — Empyrean Ensemble, UC Davis’ ensemble in residence, with a program that includes music by Composer-in-Residence Lei Liang and the Art of Migration fellows. 8 p.m., Vanderhoef Studio Theatre. Preconcert talk, 7 p.m., Yocha Dehe Grand Lobby.

• Saturday-Sunday, Feb. 2-3 — Calder Quartet. 8 p.m. Saturday and 2 p.m. Sunday, Vanderhoef Studio Theatre.

• Saturday, Feb. 2 — Stranger, Beware …: A Night of European Cabaret with Bella Merlin, professor, Department of Theatre and Dance. 10:30 p.m., Vanderhoef Studio Theatre.

• Sunday, Feb. 3 — UC Davis Symphony Orchestra, featuring Mayumi Hama on marimba. 7 p.m., Jackson Hall.

Tickets required for these events in Worlds of Discovery and Loss: Chan Park; Empyrean Ensemble; Calder Quartet, Rootstock Percussion Trio and Mayumi Hama on marimba (Feb. 2-3); and UC Davis Symphony Orchestra. The others are free. Mondavi Center tickets: mondaviarts.org or (530) 754-2787 or (800) 754-2787.

Exhibitions and jazz concert

The Warmth of Other Suns is featured in an exhibition that runs through fall quarter in the lobby of Shields Library, and two art exhibitions related to the Great Migration are set to open in March: one at the Nelson Gallery at UC Davis and the other at the Crocker Art Museum in Sacramento.

• Rebirth of a Nation: Travis Somerville's 1963 — Mixed-media installation by the San Francisco-based Somerville, who was born in 1963 in Atlanta and grew up during the civil rights movement. As a result, his work explores both historical and present day issues of racism and oppression in the United States. In this installation, visitors enter a small wooden cabin where Somerville exposes them to images, newspaper clippings and video. March 3-May 5, Crocker Art Museum, 216 O St., Sacramento.

• Views on Migration: Jacob Lawrence and Elizabeth Catlett — March 28-May 19, Nelson Gallery, Nelson Hall.

Tickets required for the Crocker concert and for admission to the museum to see the exhibition: crockerartmuseum.org or (916) 808-1182.

The book

The Warmth of Other Suns is available in paperback for $11.95 ($5 off the list price) at UC Davis Stores.

Earlier coverage

“Book project 2012-13: The Warmth of Other Suns,” Dateline UC Davis (March 15, 2012)

Follow Dateline UC Davis on Twitter.