Reading Wyoming

Northern Arapaho Experience
Wednesday, August 19, 6:30-8:30 PM
Wind River Casino, Riverton

We invite you to experience Indian Country through the eyes of the Northern Arapaho People.  Celebrate our native heritage through song, dance and storytelling.

Reading Wyoming: Sundance
Thursday, August 20, 5:30-7:00 PM
Crook County Library
Family Photographs series

Reading Wyoming: Upton
Thursday, August 20, 7:00-8:30 PM
Upton Branch Library
Rural in America series

Wyoming Film Festival
August 20-22
Platte Valley Community Center, Saratoga

The Wyoming Film Festival is a unique venue for the community to come together as filmmakers, film lovers, volunteers, corporations, and other organizations from across the state and beyond to celebrate the valuable contribution that film makes to our cultural and economic lives.  Our plan is to present film and video productions that interpret the past, present, and future of the American West in way that embrace the festival themes of environment, equality, and family.

Carissa Mine Tours
Saturday, August 22

Tours will start at the South Pass City parking lot, in South Pass City. The public will be able to see the Carissa Mill House and the newly reconstructed Head Frame and Trestle.

Due to safety regulations, tours are limited to 20 people and reservations must be made with South Pass City State Historic Site. To make a reservation Call 307-332-3684 and ask for Carissa Tour Reservations. The tour is very rigorous and participants should be able to negotiate steep terrain and steep stairs. This tour is not appropriate for young children. For more information visit our web site www.southpasscity.com.

Today’s post is a program review, courtesy of Wyoming Humanities Council Grants Coordinator Jenny Ingram! Here’s what she has to say:

Both the Wyoming Humanities Council and the Wyoming Arts Council sponsored a March presentation of The Cancer Monologues by Denver’s El Centro Su Teatro.  The play, hosted in Laramie by La Radio Montañesa KOCA 93.5 FM, explores the social and cultural issues of cancer within the Latino community.  Su Teatro originally created The Cancer Monologues in partnership with the Latino Research and Policy Center at the University of Colorado, Denver, and it’s now on their roster of touring shows.  (Other offerings include a seatbelt safety awareness play starring two Mexican masked wrestlers, and a play about the United Farm Workers march from Delano to Sacramento in 1966.)

I went with limited expectations.  How interesting can a public service cancer play be?  Let me tell you: I’m now a season ticket holder to El Centro Su Teatro!  They are fresh, they are funny, and in the best tradition of theater, they are political. (They’re also a bargain.)

Before the performance of The Cancer Monologues began, Cecelia Aragon, a UW faculty member in theater and in Chicano studies, presented a short history of Chicano theater.  She explained how the tradition (and Su Teatro) started in the late 1960s and early 1970s with the aim of highlighting social and political issues in the Hispanic community.  I love this era for its activism, and I’m always excited to encounter people and organizations from this time period who have retained their liveliness.  Thank you, Su Teatro, for keeping it real!