Somerville Public Library Book Discussion Series to Focus on Race & 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 www.somervillepubliclibrary.org.