The University of Tennessee School of Information Sciences is pleased to announce that its Center for Children’s and Young Adult Literature has been selected as one of the sponsors of the venerated May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture next April 18, 2009, at the Children's Defense Fund Haley Farm in Clinton, Tenn.
Walter Dean Myers, author of award-winning fiction, poetry and nonfiction for children and young adults, will deliver the lecture. The Langston Hughes Library at the Children’s Defense Fund Haley Farm, the Knox County Public Library, the Clinton City Library, and others will collaborate to host Myers.
“To be awarded the Arbuthnot Honor Lecture is an outstanding accomplishment,” said Dr. Ed Cortez, Director and Professor at the School of Information Sciences at UT. “I am so proud of our school faculty and our Center for Children’s and Young Adult Literature for helping to bring this lecture and the stature it brings to our school, our Center, and to the people of East Tennessee.”
Each year an individual of distinction in the field of children's literature is chosen to write and deliver a lecture that will make a significant scholarly contribution to the field of children's literature. This award is administered by the American Library Association’s Association for Library Service to Children.
The lecture will be held in the Riggio-Lynch Interfaith Chapel, designed by noted architect Maya Lin, on April 18, 2009, and will be preceded by remarks from Marian Wright Edelman, the Children's Defense Fund Founder and President. The lecture is free, but tickets must be reserved ahead of time. Information about reserving tickets will be posted, when available, on the the CDF Alex Haley Farm website. For more information about the May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture, please visit the ALSC Web site at http://www.ala.org/alsc.
Sponsored by the School of Information Sciences, the Center for Children’s and Young Adult Literature works to promote the use of literature in the education and lives of children and young adults by providing workshops for teachers and librarians, and sponsoring talks by authors and illustrators which are open to the public. Publishers of children's and young adult books agree to place review copies of their most recently published books in the Center, where they are displayed for a period of eighteen months. These books are available for study within the Center by librarians, students, teachers and the public. The Center’s new home will open in 2009 in time for its 10th anniversary.
The Langston Hughes Library of the Children's Defense Fund, a national nonprofit organization that advocates for the welfare of all children, is a special library housed in a traditional cantilever barn redesigned by Maya Lin. The library has established a reputation for offering opportunities to gather for discussions and workshops on literature and literacy and their importance to society.
For more information about the center, contact Dr. Jinx Watson, chair of the CCYAL Board of Directors, at jinxwats@utk.edu or (865) 974-8612.
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